Farmers,  Mechanics,  and  Laborers  need  Protection — Capital  can 

take  care  of  itself, 


SPEECH 


OP 


HON,  WILLIAM  D.  KELLEY, 


OF 


DELIVERED 


IN    THE    HOUSE    OF    REPRESENTATIVES, 


MARCH   25,    1870. 


WASHINGTON: 

F.  &  J.  RIVES  &  GEO.  A.  BAILEY, 

REPORTERS  AND  PRINTERS  OF  THE  DEBATES  OF  CONGRESS. 

1870. 


DCSB  LIBRARY 


Farmers,  Mechanics,  and  Laborers  need  Protection — Capital  can 

take  care  of  itself 


The  House  being  in  the  Committee  of  the  Whole, 
and  having  under  consideration  the  bill  (II.  R.  No.  j 
1068)  to  amend  existing  laws  relating  to  the  duties 
on  imports,  and  for  other  purposes — 

Mr.  KELLEY  said : 

Mr.  CHAIRMAN  :  I  presume  that  gentlemen 
who  have  listened  to  the  course  of  this  debate 
expect  me  to  apologize  for  having  been  born  in 
Pennsylvania  and  adhering  to  my  native  State. 
From  what  has  been  said  it  seems  that  her 
people  are  regarded  by  free  traders  as  a  dis- 
creditable community,  and  she,  in  her  cor- 
porate capacity,  as  an  object  of  odium. 

Sir,  I  am  proud  of  dear  old  Pennsylvania, 
my  native  State.  She  was  the  first  to  adopt 
the  Federal  Constitution,  and  was  in  fact  the 
key-stone  of  the  Federal  arch,  holding  together 
the  young  Union  when  it  consisted  of  but  thir- 
teen States,  and  she  is  to-day  preeminently  the 
representative  State  of  the  Union.  You  cannot 
strike  her  so  that  her  industries  shall  bleed  with- 
out those  of  other  States  feeling  it,  and  feeling 
it  vitally.  She  has  no  cotton,  or  sugar,  or  rice 
fields ;  but  apart  from  these  she  is  identified 
with  every  interest  represented  upon  this  floor. 

Gentlemen  from  the  rocky  coast  of  New 
England  and  the  gentlemen  who  are  here  from 
the  more  fertile  and  hospitable  shores  of  the 
Pacific,  especially  the  gentlemen  from  the  beau- 
tifully wooded  shores  of  Puget  sound,  com- 
plain that  their  ship-yards  are  idle.  Hers,  alas ! 
are  also  idle,  although  they  are  the  yards  in 
which  were  built  the  largest  wooden  ship  the 
Government  ever  put  afloat,  and  the  largest 
sailing  iron-clad  it  ever  owned.  She  has  her 
commerce  and  sympathizes  with  young  San 
Francisco  and  our  great  commercial  metrop- 
olis, New  York.  She  was  for  long  years  the 
leading  port  of  entry  in  the  country.  She  still 
maintains  a  respectable  direct  commerce  and 
imports,  very  largely  through  New  York,  for 
the  same  reasons  that  London  does  through 
Liverpool  and  Paris  through  Havre. 


Are  you  interested  iu  the  production  of 
fabrics,  whether  of  silk,  wool,  flax,  or  cotton? 
If  so  her  interests  are  identical  with  yours,  for 
she  employs  as  many  spindles  and  looms  as 
any  New  England  State,  and  their  productions 
are  as  various  and  valuable.  Are  your  inter- 
ests in  the  commerce  upon  the  lakes  ?  Then  go 
with  me  to  her  beautiful  city  of  Erie  and  be- 
hold how  Pennsylvania  sympathizes  with  all 
your  interests  there.  Are  your  interests  identi- 
fied with  the  navigation  of  the  Mississippi  and 
seeking  markets  for  your  products  at  the  mouth 
of  that  river  and  on  the  Gulf?  I  pray  you  to 
remember  that  two  of  the  navigable  sources  of 
the  American  "  Father  of  Waters  "  take  their 
rise  in  the  bosom  of  her  mountains,  and  that  for 
long  decades  her  enterprising  and  industrious 
people  have  been  plucking  from  her  hills  bitu- 
minous coal  and  floating  it  down  that  stream 
past  the  coal-fields  of  Ohio,  Kentucky,  Ind- 
iana, Illinois,  Missouri,  and  other  coal- bearing 
States,  to  meet  that  of  England  in  the  market 
of  New  Orleans  and  try  to  drive  it  thence. 
Gentlemen  from  the  gold  regions,  where  were 
the  miners  trained  who  first  brought  to  light, 
with  any  measure  of  science  and  experience, 
the  vast  resources  in  gold  and  silver-bearing 
quartz  of  the  Pacific  slope?  They  went  to  you 
from  the  coal,  iron,  and  zinc  mines  of  Penn- 
sylvania. There  they  had  learned  to  sink  the 
shaft,  run  the  drift,  handle  the  ore,  and  crush 
or  smelt  it.  It  was  experience  acquired  in  her 
mines  that  brought  out  the  wsalth  of  California 
almost  as  magically  as  we  were  taught  in  child- 
hood to  believe  that  Alladin's  lamp  could  con- 
vert base  articles  into  that  precious  metal. 

Nor,  sir,  are.  the  interests  of  Pennsylvania 
at  variance  with  those  of  the  great  agricultural 
States  ?  Before  her  Representatives  in  the  two 
Houses  of  Congress  had  united  their  voices  with 
those  of  gentlemen  from  the  West  to  make 
magnificent  land  grants  for  the  purpose  of  con- 
structing railroads  in  different  directions  across 
the  treeless  but  luxuriously  fertile  prairies, 


Pennsylvania  was  first  among  the  great  agri- 
cultural States.  And  to-day  her  products  of 
the  field,  the  garden,  the  orchard,  and  the 
dairy  equal  in  value  those  of  any  other  State. 
Gentlemen  from  Ohio,  notwithstanding  the 
statement  of  the  gentleman  from  Iowa,  [Mr. 
ALLISON,]  that  you  alone  manufacture  Scotch 
pig  iron  and  suffer  from  its  importation,  as 
you  alone  have  the  black  band  ore  from 
which  it  is  made,  is  it  not  true  that  when 
Pennsylvania  demands  a  tariff  that  will  pro- 
tect the  wages  of  her  laborers  in  the  mine, 
quarry,  and  furnace,  she  does  but  defend  the 
interest  and  rights  of  your  laborers  and  those 
of  every  other  iron-bearing  State  in  the  Union. 
Gentlemen  from  Virginia,  Maryland,  and  North 
Carolina,  Pennsylvania  is  denounced  because 
she  pleads  for  a  duty  on  coal  that  will  enable 
you  to  develop  your  magnificent  tide- water  coal- 
fields in  competition  with  Nova  Scotia.  The 
coal  of  your  tide-water  fields  is  far  more  avail- 
able than  that  of  the  inland  fields  of  Pennsylva- 
nia, which  depend  on  railroads  for  transport- 
ation. On  the  banks  of  the  James,  the  Dan, 
and  a  score  of  other  navigable  rivers,  lie  coal- 
beds  to  within  a  few  hundred  feet  of  which  the 
vessels  which  are  to  carry  the  precious  fuel  away 
may  come,  and  they  lie  nearer  to  the  markets  of 
New  England  than  those  of  your  colonial  rivals 
at  Nova  Scotia ;  and  when  you  were  not  here 
and  Virginia  and  North  Carolina  were  voiceless 
on  this  floor,  I  pleaded  with  the  Thirty-Ninth 
Congress  for  the  duty  of  $1  25  per  ton  in  order 
that  Virginia  and  North  Carolina,  soon  to  be 
reconstructed,  should  be  able  to  produce  fuel 
for  New  England  better  and  cheaper  than  Nova 
Scotia  does,  and  that  it  should  be  carried  in 
New  England  built  vessels,  so  that  the  thou- 
sands of  people  employed  in  producing  and 
transporting  it  should  constitute  a  market  for 
the  grain  of  the  western  farmer  and  the  pro- 
ductions of  American  workshops.  I  might,  Mr. 
Chairman,  extend  the  illustration  of  the  iden- 
tity of  the  interests  of  Pennsylvania  with  those 
of  the  people  of  every  other  State,  but  will 
not  detain  the  committee  longer  on  that  sub- 
ject. In  leaving  it  I  however  reiterate  my 
assertion  that  you  cannot  strike  a  blow  at 
her  industries  without  the  people  of  at  least 
half  a  score  of  other  States  feeling  it  as 
keenly  as  she  will.  She  asks  no  boon  from 
Congress.  Her  people,  whether  they  depend 
for  subsistence  upon  their  daily  toil,  or  have 
been  so  fortunate  as  to  have  inherited  or  ac- 
quired capital,  seek  no  special  privileges  from 
the  Government.  They  demand  that  we  shall 
legislate  for  the  promotion  of  the  equal  welfare 
of  all.  They  know  that  they  must  share  the 
common  fate,  and  that  their  prosperity  depends 
upon  that  of  their  countrymen  at  large. 

PROTECTION  CHEAPENS  COMMODITIES. 

Mr.  Chairman,  many  gentlemen  have  spoken 
since  this  bill  was  made  a  special  order,  and  a 
great  deal  has  been  said  upon  the  general  sub- 
ject of  free  trade  and  protection,  and  but  little 
about  the  provisions  embodied  in  the  bill  before 
the  committee.  I  am  probably  expected  to 


proceed  at  once  to  reply  to  the  i-emarks  of 
my  colleague  on  the  Committee  of  Ways  and 
Means,  [Mr.  ALUSOX,]  who  has  just  closed 
his  remarks.  But  I  may  as  well  before  pro- 
ceeding to  do  so  take  a  shot  into  the  flock  gen- 
erally. The  birds  all  have  sung  the  same  song. 
My  colleague  has  gone  more  fully  into  the 
details  of  the  bill  than  any  of  the  others.  But 
his  statements  are  all  in  harmony  with  those 
of  the  several  gentlemen  who  have  given  us  the 
doctrines  of  the  chief  of  the  Bureau  of  Statistics, 
D.  A.  Wells,  in  their  own  admirable  way.  I 
propose  to  allude  to  some  of  their  remarks. 

The  gentleman  from  New  York  [Mr.  BROOKS] 
in  opening  the  debate  promised  to  mount  a  ped- 
dler's wagon  and  ride  through  the  agricultural 
districts  of  the  country  exhibiting  hoes,  shovels, 
axes,  chains,  knives  and  forks,  cottons,  and 
woolens,  and  demonstrate  to  the  people  the 
unjust  and  enormous  taxation  imposed  on  them 
by  the  existing  tariff.  If  the  gentleman  will 
redeem  this  promise,  making  candid  statements 
of  facts  to  the  people  I  will  contribute  toward 
his  expenses  and  pray  for  the  success  of  his 
mission. 

Mr.  BROOKS,  of  New  York.     How  much? 

Mr.  KELLEY.  I  will  contribute  25  per 
cent.,  and  what  may  be  more  effective,  will  try 
to  make  an  arrangement  bj  which  the  proprie- 
tors of  Flagg's  pain  exterminator  will  give  the 
gentleman  a  seat  in  their  wagons  while  going 
through  the  country.  By  no  other  means  could 
he  so  perfectly  demonstrate  the  fact  that  duties 
which  are  really  protective  are  never  a  tax,  and 
that  protection  invariably  cheapens  commodi- 
ties. So  invariably  is  this  true  that  protective 
America,  France,  and  Germany  are  crowding 
free-trade  England  out  of  the  markets  of  the 
world  with  the  articles  named  bythegentleman, 
while  purchasing  the  materials  of  which  they  are 
made  from  her  and  paying  protective  duties  on 
every  pound  of  it.  This  is  not  mere  declama- 
tion. It  is  truth  demonstrated  by  experience. 
The  starving  mechanics  of  England  know  it, 
and  have  at  length  succeeded  in  bringing  it 
officially  to  the  knowledge  of  Parliament.  I 
have  before  me  the  report  of  a  parliamentary 
commission  which  proves,  that  notwithstanding 
our  duties  on  iron  and  steel,  our  knives  aaid 
forks,  horseshoe  nails,  &c.,  are  crowding  Eng- 
land out  of  general  markets,  that  our  hoes, 
shovels,  and  axes  are  bought  by  the  people 
of  all  her  colonies;  and  that  our  locks,  sew- 
ing-machines, and  other  productions  of  iron 
and  steel  are  underselling  hers  in  the  streets 
of  London  and  Birmingham.  There  is  the 
"report  from  the  select  committee  on  scientific 
instruction,  together  with  the  proceedings  of 
the  committee,  minutes  of  evidence,  and  ap- 
pendix," ordered  by  the  House  of  Commons 
to  be  printed  15th  July,  1868.  It  is  a  ponderous 
volume  and  replete  with  instruction. 

I  find  on  page  479  a  paper  handed  in  by 
Mr.  Field,  containing  a  "list  of  some  articles 
made  in  Birmingham  and  the  hardware  dis- 
tricts, which  are  largely  replaced  in  common 
markets  of  the  world  by  the  productions  of 


other  countries."  The  author  states  that  "this 
list  might  be  immensely  extended  by  further 
investigation,  which  the  shortness  of  time  has 
not  permitted."  Among  the  articles  enumer- 
ated are  hoes — and  I  ask  the  attention  of  the 
gentleman  from  New  York  [Mr.  BROOKS] — 

"Hoes :  for  cotton  and  other  purposes,  an  article  of 
large  consumption." 

On  this  article  the  report  remarks: 

"The  United  States  compete  with  us,  for  their  own 
u=u  and  to  some  extent  for  export." 

Then  we  have  the  following: 

"Axe;-:  for  felling  trees,  «tc.,  an  article  of  large  con- 
sumption.    The  United  States  supply  our  colonies 
j  \vorld  with  the  best  article." 

Then  there  are: 

"Carpenters'  broad-axes;  carpenters'  and  coopers' 
adzes;  coopers'  tools,  various  sorts;  shoemakers' 
hammers  aud  tools." 

With  regard  to  these  "  Germany  and  the 
United  States"  are  mentioned  as  the  countries 
"whose  products  are  believed  to  have  replaced 
those  of  England." 

Speaking  of  cut  nails,  the  report  says  : 

"  United  States  export  to  South  America  and  our 
colonies." 

And,  with  regard  to  horseshoe  nails,  which 
we  protect  by  a  duty  of  5  cents  per  pound,  and 
the  manufacture  of  which  under  that  ample 
protection  has  been  cheapened  and  so  perfected 
that  this  parliamentary  report  announces  that 
they  exclude  the  English  from  common  mar- 
kets because  they  are — 

"Beautifully  made  by  machinery  ia  the  United 

States." 

Mr.  WINAXS.  Will  the  gentleman  allow 
me  to  ask  him  a  question? 

Mr.  KELLEY.  Not  at  present.  I  will  be 
glad  when  I  have  got  a  little  further  into  my 
subject  to  answer,  but  not  at  this  point. 

Mr.  WI XAX3.  My  question  comes  in  prop- 
erly here. 

Mr.  KELLEY.     I  will  hear  the  gentleman. 

Mr.  Vv'lXAXS.  I  understand  that  the  pur- 
port of  what  the  gentleman  has  been  reading 
is  to  show  that  the  United  States,  notwith- 
standing the  high  tariff 

Mr.  KELLEY.  I  do  not  yield  to  the  gentle- 
man for  a  speech.  If  he  has  a  question  to  put, 
let  him  put  it  squarely. 

Mr.  WINANS.  I  merely  wished  to  make 
a  preliminary  remark.  But,  without  any  pre- 
liminaries, my  question  is  this:  if,  under  the 
operation  of  our  tariff,  American  manufacturers 
could  compete  with  British  manufacturers  in 
British  markets,  why  should  the  high  tariff  be 
maintained  to  oppress  our  own  people? 

Mr.  KELLEY.  The  gentleman's  question 
will  be  abundantly  answered  as  I  proceed. 
But  I  may  remark  here  that  if  by  protection 
you  secure  to  your  capital  and  industry  a  cer- 
tain market,  capitalists  will  invest  in  the  erec- 
tion of  workshops,  purchase  of  machinery, 
and  by  high  wages  will  induce  skilled  and  ingen- 
ious workmen  to  leave  their  homes  and  accept 
employment  on  better  terms  among  strangers. 
Thusunder  protection  capital hasbeen invested, 


and  skilled  laborers  gathered,  and  our  inventive 
genius  has  improved  the  methods  of  production , 
until  we  have  come  to  be  able  to  make  the  arti- 
cles mentioned  in  this  list  cheaper  than  free- 
trade  England.  But  withdraw  this  protection, 
and  you  will  enable  foreigners,  with  the  im- 
mense accumulations  of  capital  they  possess, 
to  combine  and  undersell  our  borne  manufac- 
turers for  a  few  years,  and  thus  destroy  them. 
The  purpose  of  a  protective  tariff  is  that  of  the 
fence  around  an  orchard  in  a  district  where 
cattle  are  permitted  to  run  at  large.  I  believe 
I  have  answered  the  question  of  the  gentleman. 

The  gentleman  from  New  York  [Mr.  BROOKS] 
said  that  his  heart  glowed  with  pride  when  in 
a  distant  foreign  land  he  saw  a  camel  robed  in 
American  muslin.  The  value  of  the  kind  of 
muslin  used  for  sach  a  purpose  is  almost  all 
in  the  cost  of  the  raw  material ;  it  is  woven  of 
the  coarsest  yarn.  I  wish  he  had  been  ia 
Abyssinia  in  1867  ;  how  his  pulse  would  have 
quickened  and  his  heart  expanded  as  he  saw 
that  while  England  was  wreathing  the  latest 
glory  around  her  brows  by  moving  an  army 
into  the  heart  of  Abyssinia  for  the  relief  of  a 
few  of  her  subjects,  the  ingenuity  and  protected 
industry  of  the  United  States  was  providing 
that  army  with  water  from  day  to  day. 

For  proof  of  this  I  turn  again  to  the  Parlia- 
mentary report.  It  says :  "  Pumps  of  various 
sorts  largely  exported  from  the  United  States." 
Note,  "an  American  pump  finding  water  for 
the  Abyssinian  expedition."  Those  pumps, 
unlike  the  coarse  cotton,  the  sight  of  which  so 
rejoiced  the  gentleman,  involved  a  preponder- 
ant percentage  of  labor — labor  for  the  digging 
and  carrying  of  the  coal,  ore,  and  limestone, 
and  on  through  successive  grades  of  labor  to 
their  completion,  so  that  probably  90  per  cent, 
of  their  cost  was  labor.  I  submit  the  list  en- 
tire for  the  gentleman's  consideration. 

Appendix  No.  22  to  the  report  from  the  select  Committee 
on  Scientific  Instruction,  together  with  the  proceedings 
of  Hie  committee,  minutes  of  evidence,  and  appendix. 

[Ordered  by  the  House  of  Commons  to  be  printed 
15th  July,  1868.] 

PAPER  HANDED  IS  BY  MR.  FIELD. 

List  of  some  articles  made  in  Birmingham  and  the 
hardware  district  which  are  largely  replaced  in 
common  markets  of  the  world  by  the  productions 
of  other  countries: 


Articles  or  class  of  arti- 
cles. 


Carpenters'  tools: 

As    hammers,    plyers, 
pincers,  compasses,  hand 
and  bench  vises. 
Chains: 

Of  light  description, 
where  the  cost  is  more_  in 
labor  than  in  material, 
as  halter  chains  and  bow- 
ties,  and  such  like. 

Frying-pans  of  fine  fin- 
ish. 

Wood-handled  spades 
and  shovels,  an  article  of 
very  largo  consumption. 


Country  whose  products 
are  believed  to  hare 
replaced  those  of  this 
district,  in  whole  or  in 
part. 


Germany  chiefly. 


•Germany. 


!•  Franco. 

I  United  States  exports 
>  them  to  all  our  colo- 
)  nies. 


6 


LIST—  Continued. 

LIST—  Continued. 

Articles  or  class  of  arti- 
cles. 

Country  whose  products 
are  believed  to  have 
replaeed  those  of  this 
district,  in  whole  or  in 
part. 

Articles  or  class  of  arti- 
cles. 

Country  whoso  products 
are  believed  to  have 
replaced  those  of  this 
district,  in  whole  or  in 
part. 

noes: 

For  cotton  and  other 
purposes,  an   article   of 
large  consumption. 

Axes: 

For  felling  trees,  Ac., 
an  article  of  large  con- 
sumption. 
Carpenters'        broad- 
axes. 
•  Carpenters'  and  coop- 
ers' adzes. 
Coopers'  tools,  various 
sorts. 
Shoemakers'  hammers 
and  tools, 
llachetes  : 
For  cuttingsugar  canes, 
an  important  article. 

Nails: 
Cut  . 

[United  States  compete 
with  us  for  their  own 
1     use  and  to  some  extent 
I    for  export. 

I  United  States  supply  our 
•    colonies  and  the  world 
with  the  best  article. 

Germany  and  the  United 
States. 

)  Believed  to  be  now  Ger- 
j     many. 

(United  States  export  to 
•<     South    America    and 
(     our  colonies. 
Belgium. 
(French    and     Belgian 
•<     largely         supersede 
(    English. 
(Beautifully    made     by 
<     machinery  in  the  Uni- 
l    ted  States. 

Largely    exported    by 
United  States. 
[NOTE.  —  An  American 
pump    finding    water 
for  the  Abyssinian  cx- 
.    pedition.] 

Mnny  articles  similar  to 
these  are  exported  by 
United  States  to  com- 
mon markets. 

United  States. 

The  United  States  pe- 
troleum  lamps    sup- 
plant the  English  in 
India  and  China. 
'French    even  imported 
to  England. 

[France. 

L  United   States,  France, 
j     and  Germany. 

}  United  States  exports  to 
f     Camada. 
/United      States       and 
I1    France. 

\  United  States  export  to 
/     Canada. 
(  United  States  export  to 
<     Canada  and  probably 
(.    elsewhere. 

These  articles,  in  great 
variety,  are  now  ex- 
•    tensively       exported 
from  France  and  Ger- 
many. 

Brass-foundery  stamped  : 
As   curtain   pins    and 
bands,      cornices,      gilt 
beading,    and    a    great 
variety  of  other  brass- 
foundery. 
Needles: 

An  article  of  large  con- 
sumption. 

Fish-hooks  

These  articles,  in  great 
variety,   are  now  ex- 
f    tensively       exported 
from    Germany     and 
Franco. 

Mostly  Germany,(Rhen- 
>•    ish  Prussia.)  even  iin- 
I     ported  to  England. 
Believed  Germany. 

Now    exported  largely 
from  Lidgo,  Belgium, 
and  Etioune,  France. 

}  United  States. 

Switzerland  and  France 
import  into  England, 
United    States,     and 
France, 

Guns: 
A     great     variety    of 
sporting  guns,  articles  of 
large  consumption,  for- 
merly entirely  from  Bir- 
mingham. 
Breech-loading     mus- 
kets and  revolver  pistols. 

Watches  and  clocks  

Wrought  

in    the  United  States 
interchangeable      by 
machinery.] 
Belgium. 

1  Belgium  supplants  ours 
f    in  our  own  colonies. 

(Believed  to  be  Belgium 
\     and  France. 
Prussia  and  Belgium. 

(Franco    and   Germany. 
These  articles  are  even 
imported   into     Eng- 
land. 

France  and    Germany. 
Many   of  those    even 
imported  into     Eng- 
land. 

Austria,   Franco,    and 
Itussia.     Wo  believe 
about  all  these  arti- 
cles sold  in  England 
are  imported. 

Vienna,     imported    to 
England. 
France,     imported     to 
England. 
France  entirely   super- 
seded English.  n,ndim- 
ported     to     England 
largely. 

France. 
Germany. 

France. 
Germany. 
Germany. 

France  and  Prussia. 

Franco,     Austria,    and 
Prussia, 

|  Prussia  and  France. 

Point  de  Paris   (wire 
nails.) 

Hor.°o-nails  

Glass: 
For  windows,  an  arti- 
cle of  large  consumption  ; 
spectacle  and  all  other 
glass. 

Table  glass  

Pumps: 
Of  various  sorts  

Agricultural  implements: 
Plows,  cotton  gins,  cul- 
tivators,   kibbling    ma- 
chines,      corn-crushers, 
churns,         rice-hullers, 
mowing   machines,   hay 
rakes. 
Sewing  machines  

Jewelry  : 

Gold,   gilt,  and  fancy 
steel,  in  very  great  vari- 
ety. 

Small  steel  trinkets: 
As     bag     and     purse 
clasps,     steel     buttons, 
chains,    key  rings,    and 
other     fastenings,     and 
many   others    in    great 
variety. 

Leather     bags,      with 
clasps,  purses,  aad  cour- 
ier bags,  &c. 

Buttons: 
Mother  of  pearl  

Lamps  : 

For  use   with    petro- 
leum, now  an  article  of 
ve,ry  large  consumption. 

Lamps  for  the  table  

Tin-ware  : 
Tinned  spoons,  cooks' 
ladles,  and  variouscnlin- 
ary  articles  of  fine  man- 
ufacture and  finish. 
Locks  : 
'•  Door  locks,  chest  locks, 
drawer  locks,  cupboard 
locks  in  great  variety. 
Doer  latches  in  great 
variety. 

Curry-combs  

Ilorn      

Porcelain,      (formerly 
Minion's  of  Stoke.) 

Steel  buttons,  (formerly 
Bolton  &  Watts.) 
Florentine   or   lasting 
boot-buttons. 
Steel  pens.pen-holders, 
brass  scales  and  weights. 
Iron  gas-tubing  

Traps  : 
Hat,  beaver,  and  fox,..j 

Qimlcts    and    augers, 
(twisted.) 

Brass-found  cry,  cast: 
As  hinges,  brass  hooks', 
and  castors,  in  great  va- 
riety;   door    buttons, 
sash   fasteners,  and  a 
great  variety  of  other 
articles. 

Elastic      belts      with 
matal  fastenings. 
Brass  chandeliers  and 
gas-fittings. 
Harness    buckles    and 
furniture. 
German-silver  spoons, 
forks,  &c. 
Locks: 
Best  trunk,  door,  and 
cabinet  locks. 

LIST— Continued. 


Articles  or  class  of  arti- 
cles. 


Country  whose  products 
arc  believed  to  have 
replaced  those  of  this 
district,  in  whole  or  in 
part. 


Umbrella  furniture 

Horn  combs 

Pearl  and  tortoise  shell 
articles. 

Iron  wire 

Iron  and  brass  hooks 
and  eyes. 

Bronzed  articles 

Uollow  wares,  enam- 
eled. 

Optical  instruments. 

Mathematical  instru- 
ments. 

Japanned  wares 

Bits  and  stirrups 

Coach  springs  and  axle- 
trees. 

Electro-plated  wares; 
(customers  preferring 
French  goods.) 

Gas-tittings 

Weighing  machines 

Plumbers'  brass  found- 
ery. 

Table  glass-ware 

Door  locks 

Machines  for  domestic 
purposes,  as  sausage  ma- 
chines, coffee-mills,  and 
washing  machines. 

Nuts  and  bolts 

Penknives  and  scissors- 
Stamped   brass    ware, 
(certain  kinds) 

American"notions,"as 
buckets,       clothes-pegs, 
washing  and  agricultural 
machines. 
Cutlery: 

In  great  variety ;  scis- 
sors, light-edge  tools, 
such  as  chisels,  &c. 

Pins  for  piano-strings 
and  other  small  fittings 
for  pianos. 

Silver  wire  for  binding 
the  bars,  strings  of  pia- 
nos. &c. 

This  list  might  be  immensely  extended  by  further 
investigation,  which  the  shortness  of  time  has  not 
permitted.  * 

THE  IXTEBKAL  REVENUE  SYSTEM— IT  IS  EXPENSIVE 
AND  INQUISITORIAL.  AND  SHOULD  BE  ABOLISHED  AT 
THE  EARLIEST  POSSIBLE  DAY. 

At  a  later  stage  of  the  debate  the  gentleman 
from  Ohio  [Mr.  STEVENSON]  presented  his 
views  on  the  general  subject.  He  had  pre- 
viously denounced  the  protectionists  of  the 
House  as  a  faction,  and  now  deplores  the  fact 
that  "the  beautiful  idea,"  free  trade,  "cannot 
be  wholly  realized  until  the  commercial  millen- 
nium.1' He  will,  however,  do  all  he  can  to  hasten 
its  triumph.  In  this  direction  he  goes  further 
than  Calhoun  or  any  southern  leader  ever  went. 
His  is  a  manufacturing  and  agricultural  dis- 
trict, yet  he  not  only  echoes  the  demand  of  the 
gentleman  from  the  free-trade  commercial  city 
of  New  York  for  free  coal,  iron,  salt,  and  lum- 
ber, and  a  general  reduction  of  the  tariff,  but 
leaps  beyond  him,  and  proposes  to  give  perma- 
nence to  the  system  of  internal  taxes,  which 


France  and  Prussia. 
Prussia. 

j-  France  and  Austria. 
Prussia  and  Belgium. 
{•  Prussia  and  France. 
Prussia  and  France, 
j-  France  and  Prussia. 

(France,     Austria,    and 
f    Bavaria. 

(rermany  and  France. 
B  elgium  and  France. 

I  France. 

•France. 

United  States. 
United  States. 

[  United  States. 

United  States. 
United  States. 

United  Slates. 

United  States. 
United  States. 

United  States. 
United  States. 


^Germany. 


France. 


was  established  as  a  temporary  war  measure, 
and  which  costs  annually  over  $8,000,000, 
maintains  an  army  of  tens  of  thousands  of 
office-holders,  and  makes  inquisition  into  the 
private  affairs  of  every  citizen,  and  would 
simply  remove  from  it  "irritating,  petty, 
useless,  and  vexatious  elements."  Sir,  the 
gentleman  cannot  be  ignorant  of  the  fact  that 
every  dollar  drawn  from  the  people  by  these 
taxes  is  so  much  added  to  the  cost  of.  the 
productions  of  the  farm  and  workshop,  and 
operates  as  a  bonus  to  the  foreign  competitors 
of  our  farmers  and  mechanics  in  common  mar- 
kets. But  even  this  will  not  content  him.  He 
grieves  that  other  and  more  onerous  taxes  can- 
not constitutionally  be  levied  on  the  farms, 
workshops,  and  homes  of  the  people  of  Ohio 
and  the  rest  of  the  country.  On  this  point  he 
gives  forth  no  uncertain  sound.  He  hopes  the 
Constitution  will  yet  be  so  amended  as  to  con- 
strain every  owner  of  a  farm  or  cross-road's 
blacksmith  shop  to  make  the  acquaintance  of 
a  collector  of  United  States  taxes.  On  this 
point  he  said : 

"  In  fact,  I  incline  to  the  opinion  that  one  of  the 
errors  committed  by  our  forefathers  in  framing  the 
Constitution— and  since  we  have  amended  it  ia  such 
material  matters  lately,  we  can  aiford  to  say  that 
they  did  commit  some  errors  in  framing  it — was  in 
not  permitting  direct  taxation  upon  property  accord- 
ing to  its  value.  And  some  day  I  trust  the  Consti- 
tution will  permit  the  Government  to  levy  taxes  upon 
property  according  to  its  value.  But  until  that  day, 
as  long  as  the  debt  remains  a  material  burden,  we 
must,  in  my  judgment,  retain  the  less  objectionable 
and  burdensome  parts  of  both  systems  of  taxation." 

Mr.  STEVENSON.  I  want  to  know  whether 
the  gentleman  does  not  consider  that  the  mate- 
rial part  of  the  internal  revenue  taxes  must  be 
continued  while  the  debt  remains? 

Mr.  KELLEY.  No,  sir.  I  believe  that  if 
gentlemen  will  adopt  the  tariff  bill  now  under 
consideration,  extended  as  is  its  free  list  and 
great  as  are  the  reductions  in  rates  of  duties, 
we  can  take  the  internal  taxes  off  all  but  eight 
articles  by  a  law  of  this  session  and  go  still 
further  in  that  direction  during  the  next  ses- 
sion. 

Mr.  STEVENSON.    What  articles  are  they  ? 

Mr.  KELLEY.  I  will  come  to  that  in  the 
course  of  my  remarks.  I  have  a  note  of  them. 
While  on  this  subject  let  me  say  that  I  believe 
further,  that  in  the  interest  of  the  farmers  of 
the  country  we  should  hasten  the  day  when  we 
can  take  the  tax  off  distilled  spirits. 

Sir,  the  West  has  grain  for  which  she  can 
find  no  market.  The  Governments  of  Great 
Britain  and  France,  cooperating  with  our  in- 
ternal tax  system,  deprive  them  of  what  would 
be  a  generous  market.  Take  the  tax  of  65 
cents  a  gallon  off  whisky,  and  the  grain  now 
rotting  in  the  granaries  of  the  West  would  be 
distilled  into  alcohol  and  shipped  to  the  coun- 
tries of  South  America,  the  West  India  Islands, 
Turkey,  and  elsewhere.  I  have  now  answered 
the  gentleman  as  far  as  I  propose  to  at  pres- 
ent. I  have,  however,  not  yet  done  with 
him. 

Mr.  STEVENSON.   The  gentleman  ia  crit- 


8 


icising  what  was  drawn  out  of  me  by  a  question 
from  himself.  I  ask  him  in  fairness  to  permit 
me  to  put  a  question  to  him. 

Mr.  KELLEY.     Well,  go  on. 

Mr.  STEVENSON.  I  want  to  know  whether 
the  gentleman  is  not  in  favor,  before  reducing 
the  tariff  on  coal  and  iron,  of  taking  the  internal 
revenue  tax  off  whisky  and  abolishing  the  tax 
on  incomes  entirely? 

Mr.  KELLEY.  I  am  in  favor  of  abolishing 
at  the  earliest  possible  day  a  system  that  makes 
inquisition  into  the  private  affairs  of  every  man 
and  women  in  the  country,  and  has  cost  us  for 
the  three  last  years  an  average  of  $8,509,532  77 
per  annum,  and  taken  probably  10,000  persons 
from  industrial  employments  and  fastened  them 
as  vampires  upon  the  people.  That  is  what  I 
am  in  favor  of.  But  I  hold  the  floor  for  another 
purpose  than  a  mere  controversy  with  the  gen- 
tleman. 

Mr.  STEVENSON.  Then  the  gentleman 
declines  to  answer  my  question. 

Mr.  KELLEY.  I  have  answered  the  gen- 
tleman's question,  and  every  gentleman  present 
will,  I  think,  say  I  have  answered  it  frankly. 

FREE  TRADE  MEANS  LOW  WAGKS  AND  A  LIMITED  MARKET 
FOB  GRAIN. 

Mr.  Chairman,  I  am  not  specially  familiar 
with  the  gentleman's  district.  Though  I  have 
visited  Cincinnati  several  times  and  ridden 
through  Hamilton  county,  I  have  but  few  ac- 
quaintances within  their  limits;  yet  I  know 
something  about  them.  The  last  annual  report 
of  the  Cincinnati  Board  of  Trade  informs  us 
that  during  the  year  ending  March  31,  18G9, 
there  were  produced  in  the  gentleman's  district 
and  the  adjoining  one,  in  about  3,000  sepa- 
rate establishments,  187  distinct  classes  of 
manufactured  articles,  of  an  aggregate  value 
of  $104,057,612.  The  cash  capital  invested 
in  these  establishments,  the  report  says,  is 
$49,824,124,  and  they  give  employment  to 
55,275  hands. 

Mr.  Chairman,  I  venture  the  remark  that 
there  is  not  among  these  55,275  working  peo- 
ple one  who  will  indorse  the  opinions  advanced 
by  the  gentleman. 

Mr.  STEVENSON.  Will  the  gentleman 
yield  to  me  for  a  moment? 

Mr.  KELLEY.     No,  sir;  I  must  decline. 

Mr.  STEVENSON.  The  gentleman  holds 
the  floor  without  restriction  by  the  courtesy  of 
the  House. 

Mr.  KELLEY.  I  will  yield  further  to  the 
gentleman  during  the  course  of  my  remarks, 
but  not  at  present. 

Many  of  the  laboring  people  of  his  district  are 
immigrants  and  know  how  small  are  the  wages 
of  workmen  on  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic, 
and  how  humble  the  fare  on  which  they  live. 
They  know  that  free  trade  means  low  wages. 
Buy  labor  where  you  can  buy  it  cheapest  is  the 
cardinal  maxim  of  the  free  trader.  More  than 
85  per  cent,  of  the  cost  of  every  ton  of  coal, 
salt,  and  pig  iron  is  in  the  wages  of  labor,  and 
when  the  gentleman  shall  have  stricken  the 


duties  off  these  articles,  the  1,500,000  peo- 
ple who  are  now  earning  good  wages  in  their 
production  must  compete  with  the  cheap  labor 
of  Turk's  Island,  England,  Wales,  and  Ger- 
many. Thrown  out  of  remunerative  employ- 
ment in  the  trades  to  which  they  have  devoted 
their  lives,  as  they  will  be,  they  must  compete 
with  workmen  in  other  pursuits,  even  though 
they  glut  the  market  and  bring  down  the  gen- 
eral rate  of  wages  throughout  the  land.  He 
who  advocates  protective  duties  pleads  the 
cause  of  the  American  laborer.  I  will  not 
amplify  this  proposition.  I  regard  it  as  a  tru- 
ism, and  beg  leave  to  illustrate  it  by  inviting  the 
attention  of  my  colleague  [Mr.  ALLISON]  from 
Iowa,  and  the  gentleman  from  Ohio,  to  a  state- 
ment of  the  wages  and  subsistence  of  families 
of  laborers  in  Europe,  on  page  170  of  the 
monthly  report  of  the  Deputy  Special  Commis- 
sioner of  the  Revenue,  No.  4  of  the  seres  1869- 
70.  It  refers  specially  to  Germany,  and  was 
translated  and  compiled  from  Nos.  10-12  of 
the  publications  of  the  royal  Prussian  statisti- 
cal bureau,  Berlin,  1868. 

This  paper,  gentlemen  will  remark,  was  not 
prepared  for  or  by  American  politicians,  or  by 
a  faithless  officer  of  this  Government,  or  by 
any  representative  of  a  free- trade  or  protective 
league.  Its  facts  are  most  significant. 

The  wheat-growers  of  Iowa  and  the  West 
are  suffering  from  the  want  of  a  market  for 
their  grain.  Too  large  a  proportion  of  our 
people  are  raising  wheat.  We  want  more 
miners,  railroad  men,  and  mechanics,  and  our 
present  rates  of  wages  are  inducing  them  to 
come  to  us.  Half  a  million  people  tempted 
by  these  wages  will  come  this  year.  Our 
working  people  are  free  consumers  of  wheat, 
beef,  pork,  and  mutton.  But  could  they  be, 
under  free  trade  or  reduced  duties?  These 
articles  are  luxuries  rarely  enjoyed  by  the 
working  people  of  England  or  the  continent, 
with  whom  anti-protectionists  would  compel 
them  to  compete.  The  official  paper  to  which 
I  refer  tells  us  that  "rye  and  potatoes 
form  the  chief  food,  of  the  laboring  classes  ; 
that  the  wives  and  daughters  of  brick-makers, 
coal  and  iron  miners,  and  furnace  and  rolling- 
mill  men  aid  them  in  their  rough  employ- 
ments ;  that  the  regular  wages  of  workingmen 
average  in  summer  and  winter  from  16^  to 
24  cents  per  day,  and  those  of  females  from  8J 
to  14J  cents  per  day ;  that  miners  at  tunneling 
are  sometimes  paid  as  much  as  72  cents  (1 
thaler)  per  day,  and  that  a  brick- maker,  aided 
by  his  wife,  averages  80  cents  per  day  ;  that 
wages  for  female  labor  are  more  uniform,  and 
that  18  cents  per  day  can  be  earned  by  a  skill- 
ful hand ;  that  juvenile  laborers  in  factories 
begin  with  48  cents  per  week  for  ten  hours 
daily,  and  rise  to  72  cents  per  week  ;  that  the 
general  average  of  daily  wages  is  as  follows : 
males,  for  twelve  hours'  work  per  day  in  the 
country,  19J  cents  ;  in  cities,  24  cents  ;  and  that 
the  wages  of  master-workmen,  overseers,  &c., 
are  at  least  $172  per  year."  That  gentlemen 
and theirconstituents  may  study  this  instructive 


9 


paper  I  beg  leave  to  submit  it  entire  to  the 
reporters. 

Wages  and  subsistence  of  families  of  laborers  in  Europe. 


Lower  Silesia,  translated  and  compiled  from  No. 
10-12ot'  thepublicationsof  the  Hoy  al  Prussian  Sta- 
tistical liureau,  Berlin,  1868. 

The  regular  wages  ofworkingmcn  average  in  sum- 
mer arid  winter  from  16.8  cents  to  24  cents  (gold)  per 
day ;  of  females,  from  08.4  to  14.4  cents  per  day,  more 
nearly  approaching  the  higher  rate.  During  the  short 
winter  days  workingmen  receive  for  8  hours'  labor 
from  10  to  14.4  cents;  the  females,  7.2  cents;  while  in 
summer,  for  12  to  13  hours'  labor  the  relative  wages 
are  from  19.2  to  28.8  cents,  and  from  14.4  to  19.2  cents, 
respectively.  The  wages  of  those  working  in  the 
royal  forests  are  so  regulated  as  to  average  24  cents 
per  day  for  males,  and  14.4  cents  per  day  for  females; 
in  some  mountain  countries  the  latter  receive  but  12 
cents. 

In  larger  cities  wages  rise  above  these  rates,  espe- 
cially for  skilled  labor.  Men  working  on  railroads 
receive  in  summer  from  28.8  to  36  cents  per  day ;  and 
women  from  16.8  to  26.4  cents.  In  the  larger  cities 
ordinary  female  help  in  housekeeping  is  paid  from 
24  to  26.4  cents. 

Work  done  by  the  piece  or  by  contract  is  paid  about 
one  third  more  than  the  customary  wages.  A  com- 
mon laborer  expects  in  contract  work  from  36  to  48 
cents;  at  railroad  work  even  more. 

When  work  is  scarce  the  wages  often  fall  to  about 
16.8  cents  per  day  for  males,  and  9.6  cents  for  females. 

Iiabor  is  often  paid  by  the  hour,  at  from  01.4  to  3 
cents  for  males,  and  0.4  to  2 cents  for  females;  2.4 
certs  per  hour  are  the  wages  of  an  able  field  laborer 
in  the  mountains. 

During  the  summer  especially,  opportunities  for 
work  are  offered  to  children,  who  receive  from  6.11  to 
7.2  cents  per  day,  and  in  winter  about  4.8  cents. 

Wherever  the  work  rises  above  mere  manual  labor 
in  a  trade  or  factory,  the  daily  wages  of  men  are 
from  30  to  48  cents,  and  often  rise  to  60  cents.  Miners 
at  tunneling  are  frequently  paid  72  cents,  (1  thaler;) 
in  the  district  of  Gb'rlitz,  a  brick-maker  aided  by  his 
wife,  averages  80  cents  per  day;  in  the  district  of 
Fauer  from  $5  76  to  $7  20  per  week.  Skilled  work- 
men of  large  experience  receive  from  $360  to  $432 
per  annum.  The  wages  of  the  molders  and  enamel- 
ers  in  iron  founderies,  of  the  locksmiths  and  joiners 
in  mauhine-wqrks,  in  piano  factories,  amount  to  from 
72  cents  to  $1  08  per  day;  the  same  in  manufactories 
of  glass,  silverware,  watches,  and  hat  factories.^  The 
highestwages  paid  to  a  very  skillful  joiner  in  a  piano- 
forte factory  were  $12  24  per  week. 

Wages  for  female  laborare  more  uniform  through- 
out; 18  cents  per  day  can  be  earned  by  a  skillful  hand, 
24  cents  per  day  very  rarely. 

Juvenile  laborers  in  factories  begin  with  wages  of 
48  cents  per  week,  for  10  hours'  work  daily,  and  rise 
to  72  cents  per  week.  The  law  prohibits  the  employ- 
ment of  children  under  12  years  of  age ;  from  12  to  14 
years  it  permits  6  hours',  and  from  14  to  16  years,  10 
hours'  daily  labor. 

The  general  average  of  daily  wages  is  as  follows: 
Males,  for  12  hours'  work  per  day,  in  the  country, 
19.2  cents;  in  cities,  24  cents;  harder  labor,  30  cents; 
in  cities,  36  cents;  skilled  labor,  60  cents. 

The  wages  of  master  workmen,  overseers,  &c.,  are 
not  included  in  the  above  average,  but  are  at  least 
$172  per  annum. 

In  regard  to  the  time  of  work,  laborers  in  factories 
are  employed  11  to  12  hours  per  day,  (exclusive  of 
time  for  meals;)  where  work  is  continued  day  and 
night,  the  hours  for  the  day  are  from  6  to  12  a.  m.. 
and  1  to  7  p.  m.;  for  the  night,  from  7  p.m.  to  6  a.  m., 
with  i  hour  recess;  in  a  few  disiricts  10  hours  con- 
stitute a  day's  work.  In  many  cloth  factories  and 
wool  spinneries,  males  and  females  work  12  to  13 
hour?,  and  some  even  16  hours  per  day.  As  an  ex- 
ampin,  a  cloth  factory  employs  firemen  and  machin- 
ists 16  hours,  spinners  and  dyers  14  hours,  all  others 
12hours,  exclusive  of  time  fprmeals.  In  glass-works, 
the  nature  of  the  work  requires  from  16  to  18  hours  for 
meltcrs,  13  to  15  hours  for  blowers;  but  then  one 


party  rests  while  the  other  works.  Rye  and  potatoes 
form  the  chief  food  of  the  laboring  classes. 

Savings, 

Although  but  few  worldngmcn  can  save  any  por- 
tion of  their  earnings,  still  there  are  some  who  pur- 
chase a  little  piece  of  land,  a  house,  or  a  cow,  and 
the  latest  accounts  from  fifteen  districts  in  Lower 
Silesia  show  deposits  in  savings-banks  from  house 
servants  of  $428,455;  of  apprentices  and  mechanical 
workmen  of  $124,522.  No  statistics  of  savings  of  fac- 
tory workers  were  obtained.  In  some  factories  the 
workmen  have  established  savings-banks,  some  of 
which  have  deposits  of  from  $8,000  to  $10,000. 

DETAILED  STATEMENTS  OF  THE  \VAGES  AND  COST  OP 
LIVING  IN  DIFFERENT  DISTRICTS  OF  LOWER  SILESIA. 

1.  District  of  Bolkenhain. 

The  annual  expenses  of  a  family  of  about  5  per- 
sons, (3  children,)  belonging  to  the  working  class, 
were  as  follows : 

Provisions,  (per  day,  0.144  to  0.163,)  per  year $60  00 

Rent,  (8  thalers.) 5  76 

Fuel 3  60 

Clothing,  linen,  &c 14  40 

Furniture,  tools,  &c 7  20 

Taxes:  StateO.72; church  12; cominunc36,  $1  20 

School  for  2  children 2  50 

370 


Total $94  66 


The  expenses  of  a  laborer's  family  being  24  to  26.4 
cents  per  day,  the  earnings  should  be  28  to  30.8  cents 
per  day,  which  the  head  of  the  family  cannot  earn. 
While  his  earnings  are  from  17  to  19  cents,  the  wife 
earns  8  to  10  cents,  and  the  children  must  help  as 
soon  as  old  enough.  Miners  in  this  district  have  24 
to  29  cents  daily  wages ;  factory  men  from  19  to  29 
cents;  mechanics  receive  48  to  54  cents  per  week, 
besides  board;  male  house  servants  $17  to  $30,  and 
female  $12  per  annum,  exclusive  of  board  and  lodg- 
ing. 

2.  District  of  Landeshut. 

Expenses  of  a  family: 

In  the  country.    In  a  city. 

Rent  per  annum $5  76  $10  72 

Provisions  (per  week,  90  cents,) 

per  annum 46  80*  66  10 

Fuel  and  light  per  annum 14  40  16  42 

Taxes,  &c..  per  annum 3  60  4  32 

Clothing,  &c.,  per  annum 8  56  10  00 

Other  expenses  per  annum 7  20  8  57 


Total $86  32 


$10613 


The  income  of  laborers'  (weavers')  families  does 
generally  not  reach  these  amounts.  Many  are  per- 
mitted to  gather  their  wood  from  th  e  royal  forests,  and 
spend  little  for  clothing,  which  they  beg  from  chari- 
table neighbors.  A  weaver  earns  here  from  48  to  72 
cents,  $1  and  $1  50  per  week;  most  weavers  have  2 
looms  in  operation,  and  together  with  their  wives 
earn  from  $1  50  to  $2  16  per  week.  The  average  earn- 
ings of  weavers  are  given  at  96  cents  per  week,  or 
about  $50  per  annum. 

3.  District  of  HirscJiberg. 

The  lowest  cost  of  living  for  a  laborer's  family  is 
given  at  $64  80  to  $72  per  annum,  of  which  are  ex- 
pended for  provisions  $43  30,  for  clothing  $17,  taxes 
$3  16,  fuel  $3  60,  rent  $4,  &c.  In  the  summer  the 
wages  for  12  hours'  daily  work,  for  males,  are  from  15 
to  39  cents;  for  females  5  to  17  cents  per  day;  in  win- 
ter from  3  to  7  cents  less.  A  male  farm  hand  receives 
$12  to  $22  per  year;  a  boy  $9  to  $14;  a  maid-servant 
$12  to  $18  per  annum,  with  board. 

The  annual  expenses  of  a  laborer's  family,  living 
in  a  comfortable  manner,  without  luxuries,  would  be 
nearly  double  the  amount  actually  expended  above. 

*  Per  week,  $1  08. 


10 


The  following  is  an  estimate : 

Rent,  (one  room,  alcove,  and  bed-room,) $8  6i 

Fuel  and  licht 14  40 

Provisions,  (breakfast,  coffee;  at  noon,  pota- 
toes, dumpling— 10  cents;  evening,  bread, 
a  little  brandy— 5 cents;  supper,  soup,  bread, 

vegetables — 6  cents.) 75  00 

Clothing,  (husband  $6  48,  wife  $5  70,  children 

$7  20;  soap  72cents.) 20  16 

Taxes,  <tc 2  10 

Schooling  of  children.  (2i  cents  per  week  per 

child.) 360 

School  books 72 

To  lay  by  for  sickness,  ic 8  68 

Unforeseen  expenses 8  5S 


Total $14184 

4.  District  of  Schijnau. 

The  ordinary  yearly  wages,  in  addition  to  board, 
paid  to  servants  in  this  rural  district,  were  as  fol- 
lows: Man-servant,  $14  40  to  $21  60;  boys.  €8  64  to 
$1296;  maid-servants,  $8  64  to  $17  28;  children's 
nurses,  $o  76  to  $12  96. 

During  tho  harvest  tho  daily  wages'  for  14  hours' 
work  are  as  follows :  Mowers,  from  19.2  to  28.8  cents ; 
laborers,  (malcs.)from  19.2  to 24 cents;  females, from 
14.4  to  17  cents. 

In  other  seasons  males  receive  for  10  hours'  daily 
labor  from  14.4  to  19.2  cents,  and  females  12  to  14.4 
cents  per  day ;  and  in  winter  males  receive  12  cents, 
and  females  7.4  to  9.6  cents.  A  laborer  in  the  cities 
receives  24  to  28.8  cents  per  day;  tho  "fellows" 
(journeymen)  of  trades  receive  from  60 cents  to  $1  20 
per  wec-k.  and  board. 

A  laborer's  family  of  5  persons  requirei  for  its 
subsistence  durinst  tho  year  the  following  amount : 
For  provisions,  372  to  $85  72;  rent  of  1  room  and  3 
bedroom?.  §4  32;  clothing,  Ac.,  810  80;  fuel,  &c., 
$3  60:  tMxe?,  4c.,  S3  60.  Total,  8103  04. 

5.  District  of  Goldberg. 

The  cost  of  living  of  a  laborer's  family,  (husband, 
wifo,  and  two  children.)  in  this  district  is  thus  given  : 
Provisions,  $75  00;  rentJJ4  32;  fuel,  87  20;  clothing, 
$10  02;  furniture,  tools,  &c..  72  cents ;  taxes,  &c.,  82  28. 
Total.  8100  14.  In  less  expensive  times  provisions 
hnvo  been  estimated  at?20  less. 

In  the  rural  portion  men  receive  21.6  cents,  women 
14.4  cents  for  a  day's  work;  this  average  includes 
higher  wages  for  skilled  labor. 

On  a  form  a  man-servant  receives  $17  20  per  year, 
in  addition  to  board,  &c.,  which  may  be  estimated  at 
S43  20;  a  maid-servant  receives  $14  40,  besides  board. 

Laborers  in  stone-quarries  earn  from  24  to  43.2 
cents  per  day;  in  cloth  factories  1.8  to  2.2  cents  per 
hour,  while  tho  daily  wages  of  carpenters  are  from 
33.6  to  38.4  cents :  masons,  33.6  to  45.6  cents ;  roof- 
si  aters,38.6  to  45.6. 

Shoemakers  and  tailors  receive  from  9  to  10  cents, 
besides  their  board  and  lodging,  which  is  valued  at 
12  cents. 

6.  District  of  Liiteenberg. 

Tho  yearly  expenses  of  a  family  with  3  children  are 
estimated  at  from  893  60  to  §103.  namely: 

In  city.  In  country. 


Rent 81060 

Provisions,  (81  20  per  week,) 62  40 

Fuel  and  light 12  66 

Taxes,  school,  <tc 3  60 

Clothing,  &c 12  85 

Otherexpenses 5  76 


84  32 
5572 
1080 

360 
1285 

576 


Total $107  87        $93  05 

Wages  areas  follows: 

Men,  day  laborers,  fwm  14.4  to  28.8  cents  per  day; 
women  12  to  18  centdp«rday;  men,  with  board,  9.6  to 
14.4  cent-:  per  day ;  women ,  with  board,  7.2  to  12 cents 
per  day.  From  10  to  14  hours  constitute  a  day's  labor ; 
more  hours,  and  harder  work  secure  higher  wages. 

Male  servants  per  year,  814  40  to  836,  and  board ; 
female.,  peryear,  88  57  to  821  60,  and  board. 


Journeymen  in  trades  obtain  the  following: 


Wages  per  week,  (with 
board  and  lodging.) 


Smiths 

Wheelwrights  ... 

Shoemakers 

Tailors 

Cabinet-makers. 


In  cities. 


Mini- 
mum. 


Cents. 
54 
54 
54 
54 
54 


Maxi- 


Cents. 
72 
72 
60 
72 
72 


In  the  country, 


Mini- 
mum. 


Cents. 
42 
42 
42 
30 
42 


Maxi- 
mum. 


Cent*. 

72 
72 
72 
60 
72 


7.  City  of  Grcifenberg. 

The  subsistence  of  a  workingman's  family,  consist- 
ing of  5— man,  wife,  and  3  children— is  thus  given  : 

Income. 

A  mason  receives  33.6  cents  per  day,  regular  work, 
32  weeks  in  a  year- S64  52 

Weaving  or  other  work,  4  months,  at  48  to  60 
cents  per  week,  say 

Yearly  earnings  of  wife 7  20 


Total 8T9  72 


A  day  laborer  receives  24  cents  per  day,  or  81  44 
per  week,  regular  work  40  weeks $57  60 

During  the  rest  of  tho  year  he  and  his  wifo 
may  earn 14  40 


Total $72  00 


A  carpenter  earns  a  littlo  more  than  a  mason,  his 
chances  for  winter  labor  being  bettor.  A  weaver, 
working  at  home,  makes  less  than  tho  day  laborer; 
those  in  tho  factory  earn  per  year  §72. 

Expenses  of  a  fam  ily. 

Rent.  83  64;  clothing,  §14  40,  (shoes  being  a  large 
item;)  light,  $1  41;  fuel,  85  01;  repairing  tools,  7- 
cents;  taxes,  81  44;  school  for  three  children, §1  44. 
Total,  "833  12. 

Provisions. — The  meals  consist  of  potatoes  and 
bread,  their  means  not  being  sufficient  to  allow 
moat;  potatoes,  20  bushel?,  £10  03;  bread,  (6  cents 
per  day,)  821  90;  coffee,  (chiccory,  4  pounds  per  day.) 
82  88;  butter,  (i  pound  perweek,)lard. herring, salt, 
(24  cents  per  week.)  812  48.  Total.  847  26.  Aggregate 
expenses,  880  38. 

Note.— If  the  work  is  not  regular,  the  demands  of 
the  family  must  be  curtailed,  and  suffering  often  takes 
place. 

8.  District  of  Gorlilz. 

Here  the  condition  of  tho  laborer  appears  more 
comfortable,  since  work  can  bo  found  throughout 
the  year. 

Masons  and  carpenters  earn  36  to  43.4  cents  per  day ; 
railroad  laborers,  26.4  to  28.8;  field  laborers,  21.6  to 
23.8,  and  females,  14.5  to  24. 

The  lowest  expenses  for  a  family  consisting  of  4  or 
5  persona  are  thus  computed: 

Provisions-...". 857  60    to   $85  72 

Rent,  lights,  and  fuel 11  52   to     21  10 

Clothing 13  57   to.     18  00 

Tools,  &c 144   to       288 

School 1  44   to       2  88 

Taxes....  72   to       1  44 


Total $86  29   to  8132  52 


By  careful  inquiries  it  has  been  reliably  ascer- 
tained that  a  family  can  earn  from  893  60  to  8144  a 
year,  so  that  some  lay  up  small  savings. 

For  the  city  of  Gb'rlitz  the  averngo  income  of  a 
laborer's  family  is  estimated  at  $95  to  8144  a  year: 


11 


the  expenses  for  4  or  5  persons,  from  $115  to  $172  80, 
uainely : 

Rent,  lisht.,  and  fuel $22  72  to  $32  15 

Clothing,  &e 14  40  to  21  60 

Tools,  furniture,  <tc 1  44  to  5  76 

School 4  32  to  5  04 

Provisions 72  00  to  10825 


Total $114  88  to  $172  80 


9.  District  of  Glognu. 
Farm  laborers'  income : 
Males —  0  weeks  in  harvest,  at  30  cents  per 

day $10  80 

14  weeks,  (sewing  and  haymaking,)  at 

24  cents  per  day 20  16 

15  weeks,  fall  and  spring,  at  18  cents 

per  day 16  20 

15  weeks,  winter,  at  1-1.4  per  day 12  96 


Total,  50  weeks 60  12 

Females —  6  weeks,  at  12  cents  per  day  (5  days 
per  week) $3  60 

14  weeks,  at  9.6  cents  per  day...    672 

15  weeks,  at  8.4  per  day 6  30 

15  weeks,  at  7.2  per  day 5  40 

2202 


Total,  50  weeks $82  14 


Expenses  of  a  family  with.  3  children : 

16sbeffBls*rye.  at$l  32 $21  12 

2  sheffels  wheat,  at  61  80 '...  3  60 

2  sheffels  barley,  at  SI  20 2  40 

2  sheffels  peas,  at  SI  44 2  88 

2  sheffels  millet,  at  $1  44 2  88 

24  bags  potatoes,  at  38.4  cents 9  22 

52  pounds  butter,  at  19.2  cents 9  98 

18-t  quarts  milk,  at  .24  cents 440 

Meat, (.2quarters mutton,  $3  60,lpig,  $10  80)..  14  40 

52  pounds  salt,  at  .024 1  25 

Rent.  $5  76,  light,  $1  52 7  28 

Fuel,  (wood,  $9  72,  coal,  $3  18) 12  90 

Clothing „ 18  72 

Taxes,  and  other  expenses 8  00 


Total .$119  03 


As,  according  to  these  statistics  a  man  and  wife  can 
earn  but  $82  14  per  year,  a  deficiency  of  $36  89  must 
bo  made  up  by  the  work  of  the  children  or  by  extra 
labor  in  the  summer,  especially  at  harvest  time. 

15.  District  of  Leignitz. 
Expenses  of  a  family  with  3  children: 
Provisions — 

Bread,  1  pound  flour  per  head  daily $26  52 

Potatoes,  i  bag  or  75  pounds  per  week  at  18 
cents 9  36 


Carried  over $35 


"1  sheffel  equals  1.56  bushel,  United  States. 


Brought  over $35  88 

Barley,2 sheffels,  at9G  cents 0  98 

Peas,  1  sheffel,  at  SI  08 1  OS 

Butter,  1  to  If  pound  per  week,  7H  pounds 

peryear,  at  19  cents 13  73 

Milk,  4  quarts  daily,  at  4  cents 5  84 

Meat,  1  swine  for  fattening,  or  1  pound  per 

week 5  56 

Salt,  1  pound  per  week,  at  2.4  cents 1  25 

Coffee,  chiccory,  sugar 432 

Wheat  flour  for  cake  on  holidays 1  32 

Beer 90 

Rent,  for  a  room,  a   garret-room   and  small 

space,  per  annum 7  20 

Light,  oil  for  26  to  39  weeks,  i  to  i  pound  at  6 

cents 2  54 

Fuel,  during 6  winter  months,  20 cents  summer, 

10  cents  per  week 8  00 

Clothing- 
Husband:  2  shirts,  at  72  cents $1  44 

1  pair  boots 2  88 

pantaloons,(3pairsin2years)     72 
coat,  &c 72 


Wife : 


Children : 


2  chemises $1  44 

1  pair  shoes 1  20 

Dress,  &c 2 


5  76 


5  28 


2  shirts,  at  36  cents  each..  2  16 

3  pairs  shoes 2  16 

clothing 2  16 


Soap  for  washing. 


648 
120 


18  72 

Tools,  for  repair  of. 1  43 

Taxes — income, 72 cents;  communal,  .384cents; 
school,  including  books,  $2.556 3  60 

Total  expenses $112  13 

Income  of  a  family  with  two  children : 

Husband  averages  305  days,  at  21.6  cents $65  88 

Wife  averages  250  days,  at  10.4  cents 26  00 

Oldest  child  averages  60  days,  at  7.2  cents 4  32 

Every  married  workman  receives : 

1  sheffel  wheat „ $1  8« 

2  sheffels  rye „ 2  16 

2  sheffels  barley 1  92 

1  sheffel  peas 1  06 

C96 

Ho  can  raise  on  a  patch  of  land  10  bags  pota- 
toes, valued  at - 2  88 

And  glean  at  harvest  3  sheffels  of  rye  or  barley  3  06 

For  extra  work  through  the  year 8  64 

For  a  fat  pig 5,76 

Total  income  „ ..$123  60 

In  the  city  »f  Liegnitz  the  average  expense  of  a 
laborer's  fanvly  is  estimated  at  $141  84  per  year. 


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In  two  iron  founderies,  same  district,  aver 
daily  wages,  respectively  •.  0 
Iron-bridge  establishment  
Safe  factory,  average  yearly  earnings  
Zinc  establishinents.average  wages,  first-c 

hfituls  

Second-class  hands  
Other  laborers  
Cotton  factories,  average  wages  per  hand, 
eluding  children  
Cotton  spinning,  average  wages  per  ha 
(mostly  young  persons)  
Average  weekly  wages  paid  in  the  cot 
Plauen,  Saxony  :  to  miners,  $3  10;  to  labc 
and  to  boys  40  cents. 

OO 
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2  88  to  3  60 
1  44  to  2  16 

the  chambers  of  commerce 
ng  labor  statistics  are  col- 

cnish-Prussia,  average  daily 

5,  witu  lamiiies  01  »,o<z  per-  i 
SO  04 
g,)average  wages  per 
0  Go  to  0  72 
icu  0  54 
0  43 
smiths  0  58 



Cabinet-makers  
Cloth-weavers  

From  the  reports  of 
of  Germany  the  follow! 
lected: 
In  the  coal  mines  of  Rh 

wages  ot  o.ubl  laborer 
sons,  males  
Ironfoundery,  (Duisbur 
dav,  founders  
Other  skilled  workn 
Laborers  
Machinists  and  lock 

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The  wages  of  journeymen  in  the  following  t 
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Per 
Jjakers  

Hi 

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Jia  Mj  1  j  L 

3  ^    •  *j    "  o5  ^D  £       ^    '''£ 

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£ 


^00    I     I     I     I 


,  ,38  , S.SS.S 


8050 
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eococ»eci-ii-HCOeo«o 


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ll 

•tj  o 

3* 

o  o  o 
a  S  S  2 
s»»2 


g 

el! 


15 


I     I     I     I     I     I     I          I     I     I     I     I     I     I     I     I     I     I     I     I     I     I     I     I     I     I  «O 


,  ,  ,  ,  ,3 


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st-OltOOOO 
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toooootpot 


CM  CM  i-l  CM  CN) 


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CMCOr-ld2          00    i-(55 


«MIMCOO4iO<MiMi 


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16 


My  colleague  [Mr.  TOWXSEXD]  bands  me  a  let- 
ter containing  a  statement  of  American  wages  in 
some  of  the  same  branches  of  labor.  That  gen- 
tlemen may  contrast  them  with  the  wages  of 
Germany,  as  set  forth  by  the  statistical  bureau 
of  Prussia,  I  will  hand  the  letter  to  the  re- 
porters : 

PHENIXVILI.E,  PENNSYLVANIA. 
March  '21,  1870. 

DKAE  Bin:  Your  faror  of  the  16th  is  before  me. 

Below  I  give  you  the  prices  paid  per  day  to  our 
principal  workmen,  as  follows: 

Rolling-mill  on  rail*  and  learns. 

Per  day.  Per  day. 

Heaters $4  50  Bar  mill. 

Helpers 1  70     Heaters $3  87 

Extra  helpei\? 1  60     Helpers 1  70 

Finishing  rollerman,  6  75    Rollers 2  12 

Roughingrolleruian,  2  70    Catchers 1  55 

Catchers 2  25     Hooks 1  60 

Hooks 1  80 

Hot  straightened....  2  50  Heavy  merchant  iron. 

Cold  straighteners...  3  60     Heaters 4  37 

Stochers 2  35    Helpers 1  70 

Filers- 1  50     Finishing  roller 5  00 

Laborers 1  50    Roughers 2  35 

Engineers 2  10    Catcher 1  50 

Straigh  toner 1  50 

Merchant  iron.  Mauler 1  50 

Heaters- 4  37    Engineer 1  90 

Helper 1  70 

Extra  helpers 160  Puddling. 

Finishing  roller 4  0-5    Puddler 3  00 

Roughing  roller 2  12  Puddler's  helpers....  2  00 

Catchers 1  60 

Roughing  catcher....  1  30  Labor. 

Straightencr 1  90     Common  labor 1  40 

Engineers 2  80 

I  am  unable  to  give  the  wages  paid  for  the  above 
classes  of  work  either  in  Kngland,  France, or  Belgium, 
but  I  am  satisfied  from  the  prices,  as  we  have  had 
them  from  time  to  time  from  these,  that  their  present 
pay  is  not  over  an  average  of  40  percent,  of  above. 

Respectfully,  JOHN  GRIFFIN. 

Oeneral  Superintendent. 
Hon.  WASHINGTON  TOWNSKSD. 

Mr.  ALLISON.  Will  the  gentleman  yield 
to  me  for  a  question  ? 

Mr.  KELLEY.     Yes,  sir. 

Mr.  ALLISON.  I  will  ask  the  gentleman 
whether  that  is  not  a  report  of  wages  paid  by 
a  company  that  manufactures  what  are  known 
as  iron  beams  for  vessels  and  bridges? 

Mr.  KELLEY.  They  manufacture  beams, 
rails,  and  other  heavy  forms  of  iron. 

Mr.  ALLISON.  And  is  it  not  a  company 
which  with  three  others  has  agreed  upon  an 
established  list  of  prices  for  that  class  of  arti- 
cles, which  prices  embarce  the  prices  abroad, 
together  with  the  tariff  duty  and  a  profit  on  the 
cost  of  manufacture  ? 

Mr.  KELLEY.  I  cannot  answer  the  ques- 
tion, because  I  do  not  know.  I  can,  however, 
say  that  I  hare  never  heard  such  an  allega- 
tion. But,  my  dear  sir,  I  do  not  care  what 
they  have  agreed  to  do,  if  they  are  thereby 
enabling  American  workingraen  to  keep  their 
children  at  school,  well  fed  and  comfortably 
clad,  to  maintain  their  seats  in  church,  and 
to  lay  by  something  for  old  age  and  a  rainy 
day,  and  not  compelling  them,  as  German 
workmen  in  like  employments  are  compelled 
to  do,  to  take  their  wives  and  daughters  as 


colaborers  into  iron  and  coal  mines  and 
furnaces  and  rolling-mills,  so  that  they  may 
together  earn  enough  to  eke  out  a  miserable 
subsistence. 

Mr.  ALLISON.  I  do  not  take  issue  with 
the  gentleman  upon  that  question,  but  merely 
desire  to  call  his  attention  to  the  fact  that  this 
is  one  of  four  establishments  that  have  a 
monopoly  in  this  business. 

Mr.  KELLEY.  A  monopoly  !  A  v;orkmaa 
a  monopolist!  A  poor  workman  for  wages  a 
monopolist !  A  man  who  is  earning  daily  wages 
by  hard  work  in  a  mine,  a  furnace,  or  a  roll- 
ing-mill will  hardly  be  regarded  as  a  monopo- 
list, though  his  pay  may  be  ten  limes  what  he 
could  get  in  his  native  town.  No,  sir ;  such 
men  are  not  monopolists,  though  free  traders 
constantly  denounce  them  as  such. 

CINCINNATI— HER  WOKKSHOPS  AND  WORKMKN. 

Mr.  Chairman,  90  per  cent,  of  the  cost  of 
iron  in  all  its  forms  is  the  wages  of  labor, 
and  the  wages  of  labor  go  very  largely  into 
wheat  and  pork  and  mutton  and  beef  that  are 
eaten,  and  woolen  clothes  that  are  worn  by  the 
workmen  and  their  families.  The  wages  of 
well-paid  laborers  thus  find  their  way  to  the 
pockets  of  the  farmer  and  the  wool-grower. 

Mr.  STEVENSON.  Will  the  gentleman 
yield  to  me  now  for  a  question  ? 

Mr.  KELLEY.     Yes,  sir. 

Mr.  STEVENSON.  It  seems  that  the  gen- 
tleman has  just  discovered  that  there  are  some 
manufacturers  in  Cincinnati.  I  want  to  know 
whether  he  has  not  also  discovered  that  more 
than  half  of  the  capital  and  labor  and  produc- 
tion of  those  manufactories  are  in  the  articles 
of  wood,  iron,  leather,  and  paper,  upon  which 
I  want  the  duties  reduced,  and  whether  it  is 
not  to  the  interest  of  those  producers  to  have 
cheap  raw  material? 

Mr.  KELLEY.  It  is  the  interest  of  the 
working  people  of  Cincinnati  that  the  general 
rate  of  wages  shall  be  maintained  at  the  highest 
point.  It  is  not  for  the  interest  of  any  mechan- 
ical producer  in  this  country  to  have  the  duties 
on  his  productions,  or  others  which  involve 
much  labor,  so  reduced  that  the  cheap  labor 
of  France,  Belgium,  Germany,  and  Britain  can 
come  in  competition  with  them  in  our  home 
market.  And  thus  I  fully  answer  the  gentle- 
man's question. 

The  gentleman  is  mistaken.  I  have  not  just 
discovered  that  there  are  manufactories  in  Cin- 
cinnati, for  as  I  heard  the  gentleman  pleading 
for  a  law  which  would  inevitably  check  their 
prosperity  and  progress  and  reduce  the  wages 
of  labor  I  thought  of  old  Charles  Cist,  and 
wondered  whether  his  bones  were  not  rattling 
in  his  coffin.  From  almost  the  birth  of  Cin- 
cinnati he  was  a  champion  of  protection,  and 
did  more  than  any  other  man  to  build  up  her 
workshops  and  manufactories,  and  more  than 
twenty  years  ago  devoted  a  day  to  conducting 
me  through  many  of  the  largest  of  them. 

But  I  want  to  allude  further  to  the  remarks 


17 


of  the  gentleman  from  Ohio,  [Mr.  STEVENSON.] 
Speaking  of  Pennsylvania,  he  said: 

"Ah!  she  is  shrewd!  New  England  heretofore  has 
had  the  reputation  of  great  adroitness  in  taking  care 
of  her  own  interest,  but  Pennsylvania  carries  off  the 
palm.  Quietly  she  sits  looking  out  for  herself,  wo 
giving  bounty,  she  appropriating  it.  And  now,  what 
is  the  result  ?  If  wo  suppose,  for  the  sake  of  argu- 
ment, that  the  tariff  on  iron  and  coal  is  added  to  the 
cost,  then  Pennsylvania  received  a  premium  on  her 
production  of  iron  and  coal  in  1868  of  814,859,168." 

Has  the  gentleman  a  settled  opinion  ou 
the  question,  Is  a  protective  duty  a  tax  or 
bounty?  Or  is  he,  like  Bunsby,  unable  to  give 
an  opinion  for  want  of  premises  on  which  to 
base  it?  "If  so  be,"  said  Bunsby  on  a  mem- 
orable occasion,  "as  he's  dead,  ray  opinion  is 
lie  won't  come  back  no  more;  if  so  be  as  he's 
alive,  my  opinion  is  he  will.  Do  I  say  he  will? 
No.  Why  not?  Because  the  bearings  of  this 
obserwation  lays  in  the  application  on  it." 
[Laughter.]  "  If  we  suppose  for  the  sake  of 
argument."  A  teacher  of  political  economy 
that  has  not  yet  made  up  his  mind  whether  a 
protecting  duty  is  a  tax  or  not  comes  here  and 
arraigns  Pennsylvania,  and  holds  her  up  to  rid- 
icule as  a  cormorant  fattening  upon  public 
bounty  or  plunder.  But  let  me  go  on. 

Mr.  STEVENSON.  Will  the  gentleman 
give  us  his  opinion  upon  that  subject? 

Mr.  KELLEY.  1  have  given  it,  and  I  will 
give  it  again. 

PROTECTIVE  DUTIES  NOT  A  TAX. 

Mr.  Chairman,  I  apprehend  that  no  enlight- 
ened student  of  political  economy  Jlfegards  a 
protective  duty  as  a  tax.  Even  the  gentleman 
from  Iowa  [Mr.  ALLISON]  admitted  that  in 
most  cases  it  is  not ;  yet  influenced,  as  I  think, 
by  a  clever  story  which  the  chairman  of  our 
committee,  who  is  somewhat  of  a  wag,  tells, 
he  does  not  think  the  principle  applies  to 
pig  iron.  I  hope  our  chairman,  who  I  see 
does  me  the  honor  to  listen,  will  pardon  me 
for  referring  to  the  anecdote.  It  runs  thus : 
some  years  ago,  during  the  days  of  the  Whig 
party,  when  the  chairman  of  the  committee 
[Mr.  SCHEXCK]  was  here  as  a  Representative 
of  that  party  and  a  friend  of  protection,  he  met 
as  a  member  of  this  House  a  worthy  old  Ger- 
man from  Reading,  Pennsylvania,  a  staunch 
Democrat,  but  strongly  in  favor  of  protection 
on  iron.  The  gentleman  from  Ohio,  who  is 
fond  of  a  joke,  said  to  him  one  day,  "Mr. 
R.,  I  think  1  shall  go  with  the  free-traders  on 
the  iron  sections  of  the  tariff  bill,  especially 
on  pig  iron."  "  Why  will  you  do  that?"  was 
the  response.  "  Well,  my  people  want  cheap 
plows,  nails,  horseshoes,  &c."  "But,"  re- 
plied the  old  German,  "  we  make  iron  in  Penn- 
sylvania ;  and  if  you  want  to  keep  up  the  supply 
and  keep  the  price  down  you  ought  to  encour- 
age the  manufacture. "  "But  you  kn o w, "  said 
our  chairman,  "  that  a  protective  duty  is  a  tax, 
and  adds  just  that  much  to  the  cost  of  the  ar- 
ticle?" "Yes,  I  suppose  it  does  generally 
increase  the  cost  of  the  thing  just  so  much  as 
the  duty  is ;  all  the  leaders  of  our  party  say 
so,  and  we  eay  so  in  our  convention  platforms 


and  our  public  meeting  resolutions ;  but,  Mr. 
SCHENCK,  somehow  or  other  I  think  it  don't 
work  just  that  way  rait  pig  iron."  [Laughter.] 

The  gentleman  while  admitting  that  protect- 
ive duties  do  not  always  or  even  generally 
increase  the  price  of  the  manufactured  article, 
thinks  "that  somehow  or  other  it  don't  work 
that  way  mit  pig  iron."  Now,  I  think  that 
iron  in  all  its  forms  is  subject  to  every  gen- 
eral law,  and  that  the  duty  of  $9  per  ton  on-pig 
iron  has  reduced  the  price  measured  in  wheat, 
wool,  and  other  agricultural  commodities  and 
increased  the  supply  to  such  an  extent  as  to 
prove  that  the  duty  has  been  a  boon  and  not  a 
tax.  On  nothing  else  produced  in  this  country 
has  the  influence  of  protection  been  so  broadly 
and  beneficently  felt  by  the  people  of  the  country 
at  large. 

On  the  llth  of  January  I  submitted  to  the 
House  some  remarks  in  the  nature  of  a  review 
of  the  last  report  of  Commissioner D.  A.  Wells, 
and  showed  that  after  the  production  of  Arner- 
can  pig  iron  had  been  without  increase  for  a 
decade  under  the  stimulus  of  this  duty  we  more 
than  doubled  it  in  six  years.  The  authentic 
figures  I  exhibited  were  as  follows: 

Production  of  pig  iron  in  England  and   the  United 
States  from  1854  to  1862  inclusive. 

United 

England.  States. 

1854 3J069.838  716,674 

1855 3,218.154  754,178 

1856 3,586,377  874,428 

1857 3,659,447  798,157 

1858 .3.456,064  705,094 

1859 3,712,904  840,427 

1860 3,826,752  913,774 

1861 3,712.390  731,564 

1862 3,943,469  787,662 

The  Morrill  tariff,  which  raised  the  duty  to 
$6,  went  into  effect  in  1861.  In  1864  the  duty 
was  raised  to  $9.  The  results  have  been  as 
follows : 

United 
England.         States. 

1863 4510,040         947,604 

1864 4,767,951      1,135,497 

1865 4.819,254        931.582 

1866 4.523,897      1,350,943 

1867 4,761,028      1,461,626 

1868 -  1,603,000 

1869 -  1.900,000 

In  connection  with  these  figures  I  then  in- 
vited the  attention  of  the  House  to  the  fact  that 
we  built  last  year  65  furnaces  in  15  States  of 
the  Union,  and  that  58  more  had  been  begun. 
A  few  years  more  of  such  wonderful  progress 
and  we  will  produce  from  our  own  coal  and 
iron  our  entire  supply  of  iron  and  steel  and  com- 
pete with  England  in  supplying  the  demands  of 
the  world.  The  vast  demand  created  by  the 
extension  of  our  railroad  system,  and  those  of 
Russia  and  India,  are  exceeding  the  capacity  of 
England.  She  cannot  largely  increase  her  pro  - 
duction  without  largely  increasing  its  cost.  The 
gentleman  from  Iowa  was  constrained  to  admit 
yesterday  that  the  price  of  English  iron  has  gone 
up  steadily  during  the  last  year,  because  the  de- 
mand is  in  excess  of  her  capacity  to  produce ; 
yet  the  price  of  American  pig  iron  has  fallen  at 
least  $6  per  ton  on  all  grades  within  the  last  10 


18 


months.  What  is  the  cause  of  this  reduction  ? 
Not  British  competition — aud  that  is  the  only 
possible  competition — for  the  price  of  British 
iron  has  risen.  No,  sir;  the  price  of  American 
iron  has  gone  down  under  domestic  competi- 
tion and  the  general  depreciation  of  prices. 
Keep  your  duty  high  enough  to  induce  other 
men  to  build  furnaces  and  rolling-mills  and 
before  5  years  you  will  find  American  iron 
cheapened  to  the  level  of  the  markets  of  the 
world,  and  that  without  a  commensurate  reduc- 
tion of  wages. 

HOW  TUB  INTKKNAL   KKVKNfE  CAN   HE  DISPENSED 
WITH. 

But  I  return  to  my  subject.  The  gentle- 
man from  Ohio  asked  from  what  eight  sources 
$130,000,000  of  revenue  can  be  derived.  I 
find  I  overstated  the  number  re<jnired;  but  six 
articles  are  necessary  to  give  us  all  the  income 
we  need  this  year  from  that  source.  Let  me 
state  the  receipts  from  these  six  sources  dur- 
ing the  last  year.  They  were  as  follows : 

From  distilled  spirits $45,026,401 

From  tobacco 23,430,709 

From  fermented  liquors 6,099,879 

From  banks  and  bankers 3,335,516 

From  incomes 34,791,855 

From  stamps 16.420,710 


$129,104,068 


Sir,  month  by  month,  since  the  close  of  the 
last  fiscal  year,  the  receipts  from  each  of  these 
sources  have  been  larger  than  those  of  the 
corresponding  month  of  last  year.  There  is 
a  regular  monthly  increase  in  every  item. 
Retaining  but  these  six  sources  of  internal 
revenue  we  can  mitigate  their  exactions  at 
least  by  increasing  the  exemption  from  the 
income  tax  or  reducing  the  rate,  and  still 
obtain  an  excess  over  the  amount  that  is  abso- 
lutely required.  I  am  in  favor  of  adopting 
this  course,  and  believe  that  in  three  years 
more,  or  in  five  at  most,  we  can  wipe  out  all 
our  internal  taxes  except  stamps  and  tobacco. 

Mr.  SCHENCK.     And  spirits. 

Mr.  KELLEY.  No.  I  am  anxious  to  make 
spirits  free  as  soon  as  we  can.  I  would  make 
this  change  in  the  interests  of  the  farmers  of 
the  country.  But  I  do  not  wish  to  run  into  a 
digression,  and  will  recur  to  this  point.  I  pro- 
ceed to  invite  the  attention  of  the  committee 
to  the  coat  of  collecting  the  internal  revenue. 
In  1867  it  was  $8,982,686;  in  1868,  $9,327,301, 
and  in  1869,  $7,218,610,  requiring  for  the  three 
years  the  expenditure  of  $25,528,597.  Why, 
sir,  its  abolition  would  be  equal  to  the  pay- 
ment of  $133,000,000  of  the  public  debt.  We 
hope  to  fund  our  interest-bearingdebtatan  aver- 
age of  4 \  per  cent.  This  will  save  $18,000,000. 
Before  the  end  of  this  fiscal  year  there  will  be 
in  the  Treasury  $100,000,000  of  our  bonds,  the 
interest  on  which  is  $6,000,000  per  annum, 
which,  with  the  other  sum  and  the  cost  of  col- 
lecting the  internal  revenue,  would  make  a 
reduction  of  $32,500, 000  in  the  annual  expenses 
of  the  Government.  If  the  bill  under  discus- 
sion shall  become  a  law  we  will,  I  believe, 
although  it  lightens  the  burdens  of  the  people 


at  least  $20,000,000 per  annum,  be  able  in  five 
years  to  make  even  distilled  spirits  free,  and 
rely  on  stamps  and  the  tax  on  tobacco. 
Tin:  UITKCTOI-'  PBOTECTIONO.N  PRICKS  AGAIN. 

The  gentleman  from  Iowa  said  that  pig  iron 
sells  at  $40  a  ton  and  yields  at  least  $15  profit. 
1  have  the  Iron  Age,  a  paper  of  the  highest 
authority  among  dealers  in  iron  and  hardware, 
and  I  do  not  find  it  puts  it  at  the  price  named 
by  the  gentleman.  March  12  it  quotes  prices 
at  Philadelphia  of  American  pig  iron,  No.  1, 
for  foundery  use.  as  $33  50  to  $31 ;  No.  2, 
foundery,  $31  60  to  $32:  gray  forge,  $30  to 
$31 ;  white  and  mottled,  $28  50  to  $20.  There 
is  some  difference  between  these  prices  and 
$40 ;  and  if  the  gentleman  was  as  far  out  of  the 
way  in  the  profits  of  iron-makers  as  in  the  cost 
of  iron  he  has  shown  clearly  enough  that  there  is 
no  profit  in  making  pig  iron  at  this  time.  The 
gentleman  from  Ohio  [Mr.  G.VUKIELD]  hands 
me  a  still  later  paper,  showing  a  further  re- 
duction. But  every  business  man  knows  that 
the  price  is  receding  under  the  rapid  increase 
of  domestic  competition. 

The  English  people  know  what  would  be  the 
effect  of  the  reduction  of  our  duty.  1  hold  in 
my  hand  the  annual  circular  of  a  leading  iron 
firm  in  London  advising  the  English  iron- mak- 
ers of  the  state  of  the  trade  and  the  prospect 
for  this  year.  Let  me  read  from  this  circular, 
which  I  may  say  was  evidently  not  intended 
for  American  consumption  : 

^  "No.  53  OLD  BROAD  STRKKT. 

LONDON,  December  31, 1869. 

"SiR:  Thishasbcenaprosperousyearfor  theiron- 
masters.  Our  monthly  advice  of  exports  will  have 
revealed  the  cause.  Three  countries  alone — Russia. 
India,  and  the  .United  States— have  purchased  040,000 
tons  of  British  rails.  Under  these  unprecedented  ex- 
ports the  price  has  ruled  firm,  and  good  Erio  rails 
arc  now  worth  £6  15».  net. 

"  Coal  and  pig  iron.— Over-production  has  kept 
down  the  price  ;  but  at  length  the  demand  for  pigs 
appears  to  have  overtaken  the  supply,  and  they  are 
firm  at  an  advance  of  5s.  upon  the  year. 

"Old  rails  have  been  largely  used  by  rail-mills,  and 
have  advanced  10»,  also  during  the  year. 

"Wages  have  advanced  over  the  whole  mining 
district.  At  a  meeting  in  London  this  week  the 
Welsh  iron-masters  voted  an  advance  of  10  per  cent. 

"Cost  of  the  finished  rails  to  the  manufacturer  is 
thus  settled.  The  buyer  is,  however,  more  interested 
in  the  relation  of  supply  to  demand. 

"The  supply  of  railway  bars  has  greatly  increased; 
many  merchant  bar-mills  have  taken  to  rails,  and  all 
the  mills  have  increased  their  make.  This  increased 
product  has,  however,  found  ready  sale,  and  will  not 
probably  decrease. 

"The  demand  for  next  year  promises  to  bo  good. 
Most  of  the  mills  have  orders  for  three,  and  some  for 
six  months.  Homo  railways  must  buy  inoro  largely 
than  in  I860.  India  will  also  take  more  rails.  Rus.-i:i 
is  not  so  eager  a  buyer  as  at  this  time  last  year.  The 
Government,  however,  continues  to  build  roads  for 
commercial  and  military  purposes,  and  while  the 
English  investors  retain  their  present  partiality  for 
Russian  securities  there  will  be  no  lack  of  money. 
Yet  wit.'i  the  present  out-turn  a  material  reduction 
of  the  American  duty,  or  something  eQually  signifi- 
cant, is  necessary  to  advance  the  prico  aborc  £7." 

Yes,  Mr.  Chairman,  a  material  reduction  of 
the  American  duty,  or  something  equally  sig- 
nificant, is  necessary  to  enable  the  British  iron- 
master to  advance  his  price  beyond  £7 ;  and 
the  day  the  telegraph  announces  that  we  have 


19 


reduced  onr  duty  on  pig  and  railroad  iron  will 
be  the  day  on  which  the  price  of  British  iron 
will  go  up.  I  pray  you  be  admonished  by  this 
circular. 

I  have  also  an  article  from  the  Manchester 
Examiner  and  Times  of  January  3,  1870,  re- 
lating to  cotton ,  as  compared  with  the  year  pre- 
ceding ;  and  from  what  I  shall  read  it  will  be 
seen  that  iron  is  not  the  only  English  interest 
which  will  be  improved  by  the  reduction  of  our 
duties.  The  organ  of  the  cotton-spinners  of 
Manchester  says : 

"As  compared  with  theyears  preceding  the  Amer- 
ican war,  this  country  has  received  during  tho  past 
few  years  £7,000,000  to  £8,000,000  less  per  annum  for 
the  cost  of  manufacturing  cotton,  and  there  can  bo 
no  question  that  in  comparison  with  tho  cost  of  cot- 
ton this  country  has  marketed  the  cheapest  cloth 
ever  made ;  and  if  cotton  manufacturers  on  the  con- 
tinent of  Europe  had  not  been  protected  by  high  tar- 
iffs they  would  have  been  swept  from  the  field." 

Yes,  repeal  the  protective  duties  ou  cotton, 
which  are  so  abhorrent  to  the  gentleman  from 
Iowa,  says  the  Examiner  nnd  Times  of  Man- 
chester, and  the  free-trade  league  and  the  cot- 
ton manufactures  of  the  country  will  be  swept 
from  the  field. 

THE  TARIFFS  OF  ENGLAND  AXD  FRANCE  DISCRIMINATE 
AGAINST  AMERICAN  FARMERS. 

The  gentleman  from  New  York  [Mr.  BROOKS] 
held  up  the  English  tariff  to  our  view.  Gen- 
tlemen may  have  been  surprised  to  hear  me 
say  that  I  was  very  anxious  to  hasten  the  day 
when  the  tax  on  distilled  spirits  should  be  re- 
pealed. Gentlemen  from  the  agricultural  dis- 
tricts of  France  and  England  discriminate  spe- 
cially against  you  and  your  constituents  in  their 
tariff:;.  England  d&rives  nearly  half  her  cus- 
toms from  inordinate  duties  on  the  produc- 
tions of  the  American  farmer,  or  from  agricul- 
tural products  with  which  this  country  could 
supply  her.  Let  us  look  at  the  facts.  The 
gentleman  from  New  York  held  up  the  tariff 
of  England;  said  it  yields  £21,602,414  ster- 
ling, or  $108,000,000;  but  he  did  not  invite 
your  attention  to  the  fact  that  she  raises  over 
$54.000,000,  or  more  than  one  half,  by  duties 
that  discriminate  against  our  farmers.  Yet 
such  is  the  case.  She  raises  from  tobacco  and 
snuff,  one  of  our  leading  agricultural  staples 
and  its  immediate  product,  £6,542,460,  or 
$32,712,300.  The  friends  of  free  trade  say  we 
do  not  import  enough  English  iron;  we  do  not 
import  enough  English  cotton  goods ;  we  do 
not  import  enough  English  woolen  goods,  con- 
sidering how  cheap  we  can  buy  them  all.  If 
we  are  to  reduce  our  duties  and  import  more 
I  beg  the  Representatives  of  the  farming  States 
of  the  West  to  demand  something  like  reci- 
procity on  behalf  of  their  constituents,  for 
whose  grain  there  is  no  market.  Every  yard 
of  cotton  and  woolen  goods  and  every  ton  of 
iron  represent  the  gram  and  meat  consumed 
by  the  families  of  the  men  who  produced  it ; 
and  while  our  grain  goes  to  waste  for  the  want 
of  purchasers,  the  friends  of  protection  protest 
against  importing  that  grown  in  other  coun- 
tries, even  when  converted  into  cloth  or  iron. 
The  cloth  and  iron  would  be  as  good  if  made 


where  well-paid  laborers  eat  freely  of  Ameri- 
can wheat,  butter,  and  meat ;  and  to  those  who 
cannot  sell  their  crop  at  any  price  a  neighbor- 
ing furnace,  factory,  or  rolling-mill  would  be  a 
blessing,  even  though  they  could  not  bay  cloth 
or  iron  at  English  prices.  Bull  must  proceed. 
I  have  shown  that  of  the  $108,000,000  Eng- 
land raises  by  her  tariff  she  gets  $32,712,300 
by  duties  on  one  of  our  agricultural  staples. 
Her  duties  en  tobacco  are  taxes,  for  England 
has  no  tobacco-fields  to  develop.  They  are, 
therefore,  not  protective  duties.  Like  our 
duties  on  tea,  coffee,  pepper,  and  spice,  they 
are  taxes  purely.  But  let  us  go  a  little  further 
into  this  matter.  England  raises  $21,667,565 
on  spirits.  This  is  an  absolute  discrimination 
against  our  gjain.  Were  that  duty  removed 
the  farmer  and  distiller  would  be  working 
together,  and  instead  of  exporting  wheat  and 
corn  at  prices  that  will  not  cover  the  cost  of 
production  and  transportation  their  produce 
would  be  manufactured  into  alcohol,  pork,  and 
lard  oil;  and  while  our  own  laboring  people 
would  have  cheaper  provisions  the  farmer 
would  greatly  reduce  the  cost  of  transportation 
and  have  an  ample  market  for  his  grain  man- 
ufactured into  alcohol,  pork,  and  oil.  Yet 
gentlemen  representing  agricultural  districts 
plead  with  us  to  admit  British  goods  at  lower 
rates,  while  she  gathers  $54,599,865  ia  a  single 
year  by  imposing  such  duties  on  tobacco  as 
greatly  diminish  its  consumption  and  such  on 
spirits  as  preclude  the  importation  of  our  grain 
in  the  only  forms  in  which  it  can  be  profitably 
exported. 

EXGLAXD  A  HIDEOUS    MONOPOLY— FREE  TRADE    SUP- 
PORTS IT. 

Mr.  BROOKS,  of  New  York.  Let  me  state 
that  our  great  agricultural  products — cotton, 
which  is  an  immense  product,  and  wheat,  corn, 
&c. — are  admitted  duty  free. 

Mr.  KELLEY.  To  that  I  reply  that  they 
take  our  cotton  because  they  cannot  live  with- 
out it,  and  our  wheat  and  corn  when  they  cannot 
buy  cereals  cheaper  elsewhere.  France  has  a 
duty  on  wheat  and  flour  even  when  imported 
in  French  vessels.  We  are  too  far  from  the 
sea-board,  and  the  cost  of  transportation  from 
our  grain-fields  is  too  great  for  us  to  send  them 
grain  in  bulk  at  present  prices.  The  cheapest 
way  of  transporting  corn  is  in  the  form  of  alco- 
hol. In  this  form  we  could  send  it  profitably 
were  their  duties  not  prohibitory.  England 
will  take  raw  materials  from  countries  from 
which  she  can  buy  cheapest.  But  her  much- 
lauded  free  trade  does  not  offer  any  advan- 
tage to  the  American.  Gentlemen  talk  about 
monopolists,  and  aver  that  protection  fosters 
monopolies.  Sir,  the  world  has  never  seen, 
so  heartless,  BO  unrelenting,  and  so  gigantic 
a  monopoly  as  the  British  Government  and 
the  manufacturing  power  that  sustains  it.  It 
is  a  monopoly  which  has  desolated  Ireland' 
and  swept  ner  factories  from  the  face  of  the ' 
earth.  Ireland,  less  than  a  century  ago,  before 
the  union,  the  home  of  a  contented  people,  and, 
the  seat  of  a  busy  and  prosperous  industry,  is 


20 


now  a  land  whose  people  tire  born  only  to  be 
watched  and  hunted  us  felons,  or  exiled  from 
theland  they  love  »o  well.  The  manufacturing 
and  landed  monopoly  of  England  but  a  few 
years  ago  huddled  into  their  graves  the  decay- 
ing bodies  of  more  than  1,000,000  of  the  people 
of  Ireland,  who  died  of  starvation  in  a  single 
year. 

It  is  a  monopoly  which  has  inflicted  on  Brit- 
ish India  wrongs  even  greater  than  these. 
Three  years  ago  the  air  of  the  whole  wide 
district  of  Orissa  was  fetid  with  the  stench 
rising  from  the  decaying  bodies  of  more  than 
1,000,000  people  who  had  starved  in  one  of 
the  richest  agricultural  regions  in  the  world, 
because  under  England's  enlightened  free 
trade  they  were  not  permitted  to  diversify  their 
industries,  and  when  their  single  crop  failed 
they  were  permitted  to  starve,  as  the  Irish  were 
when  the  rot  assailed  their  only  crop,  the  po- 
tato. This  English  monopoly  is  so  absolute 
and  selQsh  that  it  will  not  allow  provinces  and 
colonies  to  diversify  their  industry.  It  binds 
them  to  the  culture  of  one  product — India,  cot- 
ton, and  Ireland,  men  for  exportation.  Shall 
she  also  hold  the  people  of  the  Northwest  as 
her  commercial  subjects  and  doom  them  to 
raise  wheat  and  wheat  alone?  We  can  break 
its  power  and  overthrow  this  monstrous  mo- 
nopoly. Yes,  by  peaceful  arts,  without  the 
clash  of  arms,  we  can  emancipate  the  hundreds 
of  millions  of  people  England  now  oppresses. 
The  source  ot  her  power  is  her  commercial 
and  manufacturing  supremacy,  and  thiswecan 
and  should  undermine,  as  we  are  its  chief  sup- 
port. With  our  cotton-fields,  our  widespread 
and  inexhaustible  deposits  of  all  the  metals, 
and  our  immense  sheep-walks,  we  should  sup- 
ply all  our  wants.  When  we  do  this  our  com- 
merce will  revive,  for  populous  nations  that 
supply  their  own  markets  always  produce  a  sur- 
plus which  they  can  export  at  low  prices.  But 
now  England  properly  regards  us  as  a  depend- 
ency more  profitable  than  "all  the  English- 
speaking  dependencies  of  the  empire."  On 
this  point  the  London  Times  of  February  25, 
when  discussing  the  bill  now  under  considera- 
tion, says: 

"The  fiscal  policy  of  tho  United  States  is  for  us  a 
subject  of  no  reinoteor  transient  interest.  Although 
statistics  may  be  adduced  to  prove  that  in  propor- 
tion to  population  the  colonies  are  our  best  custom- 
ers, yet  in  tho  mass  our  trade  with  republican  Amer- 
ica is  by  far  tho  largest  item  in  the  balance-sheet  of 
our  exports  to  foreign  countries,  and  is  nearly  equal 
to  that  with  all  tho  English-speaking  dependencies 
of  tho  empire." 

A.  HOME  MARKET— A  PREDICTION  FULFILLED. 

Gentlemen  sneer  at  the  idea  of  a  home  mar- 
let.  Sir,  on  the  1st  of  June,  1868,  we  had 
tinder  consideration  a  proposition  to  permit 
table  whisky  to  remain  m  bond  under  certain 
conditions.  In  the  course  of  the  discussion  I 
urged  upon  gentlemen  from  the  West  who  were 
opposing  it  the  propriety  of  giving  effect  to 
that  proposition.  I  pressed  upon  the  atten- 
tion of  the  House  the  fact  that  age  quadrupled 
the  value  bj  improving  the  quality  of  fine 


whisky,  and  that  our  whisky  was  supersed- 
ing French  brandy  in  general  use.  1  urged 
the  importance  of  this  to  the  grain-growing 
States.  Turning  to  my  remarks  i  find  the  fol- 
lowing prediciion,  the  fulfillment  of  which  has 
occurred  even  before  1  expected  it: 

"The  people  of  the  Northwest,  it  s.M-m:,  to  me,  nro 
specially  interested  in  this  question.  They  will  liiid 
that  they  caunot  afford  to  expel  from  their  inland 
section  of  the  country  any  brunch  of  manufactures. 
They  need  tho  opportunity  to  export  their  grain  con- 
centrated in  the  form  of  whisky,  high-wines,  or  other 
manufactures.  lamii"'  and  they  will  not 

believe  me,  but  I  tell  them  they  are  entering  upon  a 
competition  that,  will  exclude  them  froui  the  markets 
of  the  world  if  they  depend  upon  the  export  of  their 
KiMiu  in  bulk  as  food  or  mere  raw  material.  Do  you 
mark,  gentlemen  of  Missouri,  Illinc,  .nsin, 

that  California  is  loud  in  the  expression  of  her  grati- 
tude  for  tho  fact  that  I'M  vessels  have  bccu  added  to 
thefleetfor  carrying  her  grain  to  JS'tw  York  and  t: 
atlantic  ports?  Tucy  can  send  grain  in  bulk  23,000 
miles  to  thesoa-boardof  New  England  or  Old  England 
at  less  cost  for  transportation  than  you  can  send  yours 
to  the  sea-board  by  rail.  Ore;,-"  ,  Tunder  her 

crop  of  wheat,  and  her  peoplcarc  fea:-ir:s,'  t  hat  mean-; 
of  its  transportation  to  market  may  p.ot  bo  at  hand. 
But  this  distant  competition  is  not  what  you  have 
most  cause  to  dread.  The  South,  no  longer  your 
customer  for  food  for  man  and  beast,  looms  up  your 
competitor.  Her  advantages  over  you  are  manifold 
as  they  are  manifest.  She  lies  between  you  and  the 
ocean.  Her  grain-fields  are  upon  the  banks  of  navi- 
gable rivers  which  flow  to  the  Gulf  ot  the  ooean.  :\n  1 
at  or  near  the  mouth  of  each  is  a  sea-port.  From  Nor- 
folk around  to  Galvcston,  Texas,  the  grain  of  the 
farmers  of  the  several  States  may  be  floated  to  the 
sea-board  upon  rafts  and  there  find  shipping.  Ens- 
land  and  western  Europe  are  not  t'uo  countries  to 
which  wo  chiefly  export  grain  and  flour.  Our  chief 
markets  for  these  are  Central  and  South  America, 
and  tho  islands  to  which  the  southern  States  are 
neighbors;  and  I  tell  you  that  if  the  people  of  the  far 
Northwest  do  not  take  heed,  and  by  diversifying  their 
industry  convert  their  raw  materials  into  more  com- 
pact productions,  the  day  is  not  three  years  distant 
when  their  crops  will  waste  in  the  fields  for  the  want 
of  a  market  to  which  they  will  pay  the  cost  of  trans- 
portation." 

Not  two  years  have  gone  by,  and  you  are 
crying  out  that  you  have  raised  wheat  in  vain, 
that  there  is  no  market  for  it ;  that  the  cost  of 
getting  it  to  a  market  consumes  it.  Ay,  and 
the  gentleman  from  Iowa  [Mr.  ALLISOX]  says 
that  in  the  face  of  these  facts  we  are  offering 
inducements  to  thousands  to  go  at  wheat-grow- 
ing, that  the  homestead  law  is  tempting  immi- 
grants to  engage  in  wheat-growing  aud  add  to 
the  unsalable  and  unavailable  stock.  That  is 
true;  and  how  would  he  improve  matters? 
He  agrees  with  me  that  the  homestead  law  is 
beneficent  and  should  not  be  repealed.  What, 
then,  is  the  gentleman's  proposition.  It  is 
identical  with  those  we  have  heard  from  so 
many  gentlemen — reduced  duties  on  coal,  salt, 
hides,  lumber,  iron,  and  woolen  goods. 

This  is  the  burden  and  refrain  of  all  the  sweet 
singers  trained  in  the  musical  academy  of  D. 
A.  Wells,  Commissioner  of  Revenue,  and  let 
us  right  here  test  its  merit.  Lower  the  duties 
on  coal,  salt,  lumber,  hides,  iron,  and  woolen 
goods.  Well,  how  will  this  increase  the  num- 
ber of  consumers  of  American  grain  or  dimin- 
ish the  number  of  grain-growers?  There  are 
more  than  1,500,000  of  our  people  engaged  in 
or  dependent  on  the  labor  of  producing  these 
articles.  What  will  become  of  them?  They 


21 


cannot  live  on  "rye  and  potatoes,"  as  German  [ 
workmen  in  the  same  trades  do.  They  will 
not  even  be  content  to  get  meat  once  a  week, 
as  the  workmen  of  England  are  ;  and  if  they 
be  not  work  must  stop.  And  I  ask  gentle- 
men from  the  grain  country  what  they  suppose 
these  people  will  do  with  themselves  when  the 
fire  has  gone  out  in  the  forge  and  furnace,  and 
the  loom  and  spindle  stand  still,  and  the  salt- 
kettle  rusts,  and  there  is  no  work  in  the  coal 
mine  because  the  manufactures  that  made  a 
market  for  it  have  been  transferred  to  foreign 
countries  in  which  wages  are  low  and  where  the 
"working  people  live  on  rye  and  potatoes.1' 

Thank  God,  we  cannot  doom  them  to  this 
fate.  The  homestead  law  is  their  protection. 
In  a  cabin  on  120  acres  of  public  land  they 
can  raise  wheat,  potatoes,  and  a  few  sheep  and 
pigs;  the  old-fashioned  spinning-wheel  and 
loom,  easily  made  by  skilled  mechanics,  will 
convert  their  home-grown  wool  into  fabrics, 
and  they  can  thus  live  till  wiser  legislators  suc- 
ceed us  and  reanimate  the  general  industries 
of  the  country  by  restoring  the  protective  sys- 
tem now  in  force. 

Is  that  the  remedy?  Is  free  trade  a  specific 
for  all  or  any  of  our  ills?  No,  sir,  it  is  sheer 
quackery,  charlatanism.  The  only  cure,  the 
evil  of  which  western  grain-growers  complain, 
is  to  increase  the  number  of  consumers  and 
decrease  the  number  of  growers  of  wheat;  raise, 
if  possible,  the  wages  of  workmen  so  as  to  make 
mechanical  employments  attractive ;  say  to  the 
farmers'  sous,  "  There  is  work  and  good  wages 
for  you  in  the  machine-shop,  the  forge,  the  fur-  I 
nace,  or  the  mill;"  say  to  the  men  whose  capital 
is  unproductive  on  farms,  "Build  mills,  sink 
shafts  to  the  coal-bed  which  underlies  your 
farm ;  avail  yourselves  of  the  limestone  quarry 
and  the  ore-bed,  whether  of  iron,  lead,  copper, 
zinc,  or  nickel;  employ  your  industry  and  cap- 
ital so  that  it  shall  be  profitable  to  you,  your 
country,  and  mankind;"  and  in  a  little  while 
you  will  cheapen  iron  and  steel  and  make  an 
adequate  market  for  all  the  grain  of  the  coun- 
try. The  gentleman's  remedy  is  the  theory  of 
the  homeopathic  physician,  that  like  cures  like, 
which  though  it  may  be  correct  in  physics,  is 
not  an  approved  maxim  in  social  science. 

Mr.  ALLISON.  I  would  like  the  gentleman 
to  state  how  long  it  will  be  before  that  happy 
period  will  arrive? 

Mr.  KELLEY.  Well,  sir,  I  cannot  tell 
exactly.  It  will  depend  upon  the  degree  of 
promptness  with  which  the  remedy  is  applied. 
But  if  the  Clerk  will  do  me  the  kindness  to  give 
me  a  little  rest  by  reading  a  letter  from  an  Irish 
patriot,  one  who  knew  England's  tenderness  for 
her  laboring  people  experimentally  at  home  in 
Ireland,  and  who  laid  one  of  his  limbs  away  in 
the  service  of  our  country  during  the  war,  and 
now  lives  in  Quincy,  Illinois,  I  will  endeavor  to 
give  the  gentleman  some  idea. 

The  Clerk  read  as  follows : 

"We  have  a  population  of  £5,000  or  40.000.  and  our 
citizens  are  just  commencing  to  awake  to  the  neces- 
sity of  enoouraging  local  manufacturing.  We  have 


2  paper  mills,  10  flour  mills,  5  tobacco  factories;  sales 
$1.300,000;  9  machine-shops;  sales  81,050.000;  5  ma- 
chine ibunderies;  4  stove  founderies  turned  out  last 
year  36,400  stoves,  amounting  to  $473,200  cash  sales: 
2  boilershops,  turning  out$216,000  per  year ;  15  wagon 
and  plow  shops,  with  a  capital  of  $260,000 ;  4  planing 
mills,  capital  $180,000;  14  manufacturers  of  saddles 
and  harness.capital  §233,400 ;  and  numerous  others  too 
tedious  to  mention.  There  is  a  company  at  present 
engaged  in  boring  for  coal,  with  fine  prospects  of  suc- 
cess. If  we  can  only  get  coal  here  manufacturing 
will  spring  up  all  around  us.  I  have  thought  some 
of  organizing  a  stock  company  to  build  factories  and 
supply  funds  to  encourage  skilled  workmen  to  enter 
into  what  is  called  the  cooperative  system.  I  shall 
shortly  test  the  matter  to  see  if  it  can  be  made  to 
work. 

"If  the  friends  of  protection  can  hold  their  own 
till  after  cho  taking  of  the  census  the  crisis  will  be 
passed,  for  that  will  show  such  progress  in  the  mate- 
rial wealth  of  the  nation  that  it  will  require  a  bold 
man  indeed  to  attack  our  system  of  labor.  It  is  use- 
less for  us  to  talk  of  competing  with  England  while 
she  keeps  as  many  of  her  people  in  her  poor-houses 
as  she  does  in  her  public  schools — a  country  that 
expends  seven  eighths  more  to  keep  up  her  poor- 
houses  than  she  does  to  support  her  schools.  Eng- 
land and  Scotland  have  a  population  of  24,599,277, 
for  the  education  of  which  she  has  14,591  schools, 
with  12,832  teachers,  costing  annually  $4,212,500, 
while  she  expends  for  her  poor-houses  annually 
$32,595,000.  Compare  her  with  Illinois,  a  State  sixty 
years  ago  in  possession  of  the  savages,  but  now  pos- 
sessing a  population  of  about  2,500,000,  with  11,000 
schools  and  20,000  teachers,  costing  $6,500,000  an- 
nually, more  than  50  per  cent,  greater  than  England, 
with  a  population  ten  times  larger  than  us.  The 
free-trader  says  that  pauperism  is  growing  less  in 
England  under  her  free-trade  system;  but  I  find, 
from  Purdy's  Report  in  1866,  she  had  842,860;  and  I 
see  by  the  American  Cyclopedia  of  1863  for  that  year 
1,034,832  paupers  are  reported.  These  are  facts  for 
the  American  people  to  profit  by.  It  is  reported 
that  there  are  now  in  London  more  than  SO.OOOskillcd 
workmen  out  of  employment.  We  hear  much  about 
English  liberty,  but  I  have  been  9f  the  opinion  that 
the  kind  of  liberty  they  are  enjoying  is  that  the  .wolf 
accords  the  lamb  or  the  strong  toward  the  weak  in 
all  nations — a  liberty  which,  I  trust,  will  never  find 
a  place  among  our  institutions. 

' '  The  sympathizers  or  advocates  of  this  English  sys- 
tem say  that  free_  trade  will  give  us  a  market  for  our 
surplus  produce  in  Europe.  But  I  find  the  more  we 
ship  the  less  we  receive.  In  1868  we  exported  to 
England  4,414,230  hundred  weight  of  wheat,  receiv- 
ing therefor  §17,952,850;  in  1869,  for  the  same  period, 
7.9.38,818  hundred  weight,  receiving  therefrom  only 
517,740,770,  or  §211,000  less  than  we  received  for  half 
the  amount  the  previous  year.  If  wojvere  to  change 
our  policy,  and  instead  of  sending  ourVhcat  to  Eng- 
land induce  those  80,000  skilled  workmen  to  come  to 
us  we  would  not  then  be  compelled  to  look  to  Eng- 
land for  a  market.  They  will  be  compelled  to  come 
to  us  for  our  cotton  and  tobacco;  but  there  is  no 
need  of  us  going  to  them  for  manufactured  goods. 
We  can  take  their  surplus  labor,  transfer  it  to  this 
country,  and  ultimately  tend  to  the  welfare  9f  both, 
and  thereby  accomplish  more  than  the  sentimental 
philanthropists  of  Europe  and  America  can  ever  do 
by  preaching  "  free_  trade."  We  are  influenced  too 
much  by  the  political  economists  of  Europe,  who 
write  to  tickle  the  fancy  of  the  wealthy  few,  without 
any  regard  to  the  rights  of  the  laboring  millions." 

Mr.  KELLEY.  I  desire  in  this  connection, 
and  before  turning  to  other  topics,  to  present  a 
brief  extract  from  a  speech  made  in  the  United 
States  Senate  by  the  experienced  merchant  and 
enlightened  statesman  who  represents  New 
Jersey  in  that  body,  Hon.  ALEXANDER  G.  CAT- 
TELL.  In  the  course  of  his  remarks  on  the  22d 
of  January,  1867,  he  said: 

"But,  Mr.  President,  the  harmony  of  interests 
which  exists  between  agriculture  and  manufactures, 
and  the  truth  of  the  position  I  have  taken,  are  clearly 
shown  by  actual  results.  I  am  sure  the  Senate  will 


22 


excuse  me  if  I  draw  an  illustration  from  personal 
observation  in  my  own  mercantile  life.  Twenty 
years  ago  last  autumn  I  embarked  in  the  trade  in 
breadstuffs  in  the  city  of  Philadelphia.  At  that  time, 
and  for  some  succeeding  years,  the  entire  volume  of 
my  business  was  made  up  of  consignments  of  agri- 
cultural products  from  the  valleys  of  the  Susque- 
hanna,  the  Juniata.  and  theLohigh.  I  have  not  the 
figures  at  command,  but  I  am  sure  I  speak  within 
bounds  when  I  say  that  my  own  house  and  the  four 
or  five  others  doing  business  from  the  samo  points 
must  have  received  from  this  quarter  4,000,000  to 
5,000.000  bushels  of  cereals  per  annum.  Philadelphia 
is  still  tho  natural  market  for  tho  surplus  product 
of  this  territory,  but  for  some  years  past  there  have 
not  been  consignments  enough  received  from  that 
entire  section  to  realize  commissions  sufficient  to  pay 
the  salary  of  a  receiving  clerk. 

"Do  you  ask,  has  production  fallen  off?  I  answer, 
no;  on  the  contrary,  it  has  increased,  but  the  whole 
line  of  these  valleys  has  been  dotted  with  furnaces 
and  forges  and  rolling-mills  and  saw-mills  and  fac- 
tories and  workshops,  filled  with  operatives,  and  the 
consumer  of  agricultural  products  has  been  brought 
to  the  farmer's  doors.  lie  now  finds  a  readier  mar- 
ket for  his  products  at  home  at  prices  equal  to  those 
ruling  on  the  sea-board,  of  which  ho  avails  himself 
and  thus  saves  all  the  cost  of  transportation  and  fac- 
torage, equal  at  average  prices  to  about  20  per  cent. 
Nay,  more,  sir,  my  own  firm  has  frequently  within 
the  past  few  years  sold  and  shipped  to  the  millers  in 
•one  of  these  valleys,  that  in  which  the  iron  interest 
has  been  most  developed,  tho  Lchigh,  wheat  drawn 
from  Michigan,  Illinois,  Wisconsin,  and lowato sup- 
ply the  deficiency  in  the  consumptive  want.  And 
these  products  of  the  prairies  of  tho  West  were  sold, 
too,  at  a  price  far  in  excess  of  what  could  havo  been 
realized  by  exportation  to  any  country  on  the  face 
of  the  globe.  As  aconscquenceofthisstatoo_f  things 
land  has  risen  in  value  through  all  this  section,  and 
farms  that  could  havo  been  boughtfiftecu  or  twenty 
years  ago  at  840  or  $50  per  acre  are  now  salable  at 
$150  or  $200  per  acre.  Villages  have  grown  to  be 
towns,  and  towns  have  grown  to  bo  cities,  agriculture 
and  manufactures  havo  clasped  hands  and  prosperity 
reigns." 

PROTECTION  STIMULATES  IMMIGKATIOW. 

Sir,  the  gentleman  from  Iowa  asked  how 
long  it  would  take  if  we  shut  up  our  machine- 
shops  and  mills,  and  closed  our  coal-mines,  to 
turn  100,000  men  into  agriculturists.  It  would 
take  one  season. 

Mr.  ALLISON.  Oh  no  ;  that  was  not  my 
question. 

Mr.  KELfcEY.  That  was  what  I  was  stating 
when  you  interrupted  me. 

Mr.  ALLISON.  I  wanted  to  know  how  long 
it  would  be  before  iron  and  steel  would  be  pro- 
duced at  a  cheaper  rate  than  it  is  now  imported. 
That  was  my  question. 

Mr.  KELLE  Y.  I  do  not  think  I  said  cheaper 
than  it  is  now  imported,  but  cheaper  than  it 
can  then  be  imported.  As  the  price  goes  down 
here  it  is  going  up  in  England;  and  under  the 
present  duty  we  will  soon  be  able  to  supply 
our  own  demand,  and  meet  England  in  com- 
mon markets  at  equal  prices.  Sir,  I  want  to 
show  gentlemen  from  the  West  what  effect 
the  tariff  has  on  immigration.  I  have  before 
me  the  tariffs  from  the  organization  of  the  Gov- 
ernment down  to  the  present  time,  given  in  ad 
valorem  percentages,  and  a  statement  of  the 
number  of  immigrants  that  arrived  in  each 
year,  from  1856  to  1869  inclusive.  By  com- 
paring them  I  find  that  whenever  our  duties 
have  been  low  immigration  fell  off,  and  when- 
ever our  duties  have  been  high  the  volume  of 


immigration  increased.  This  seems  to  be  a 
fixed  law. 

Both  papers  are  taken  from  the  immaculate 
report  of  David  A.  Wells,  Special  Commis- 
sioner of  Internal  Revenue,  and  I  therefore 
present  them  with  some  hesitancy,  and  with 
the  remark  that  if  they  are  incorrect  it  is  not 
my  fault. 

I  find  by  these  tables  that  in  the  nine  years 
from  1836  to  1864,  inclusive,  we  received 
1,403,497  immigrants;  and  in  the  four  years 
of  the  protective  tariff,  of  which  so  many 
gentlemen  from  the  West  whose  States  are 
not  overcrowded  complain,  wo  have  received 
1,514,816,  or  over  111,000  more  in  the  four 
years  of  protection  than  in  the  nine  preceding 
years  of  free  trade  and  low  tariff.  13ut  1  had 
better  let  the  statement  speak  for  itself.  In 
introducing  it  Mr.  Wells  says : 

"The  following  is  a  revised  and  tho  most  acoijrato 
attainablostatement  of  tho  course  of  alien  immigra- 
tion into  the  United  States  since  and  including  the 
year  1856: 

1856 ..  200,436 

1857 2.~>l,:jOfl 

1838.. 123,12(5 

1859 121,282 

1860 IM.lMO 

1861 91,920 

1862 91.987 

1863 170.282 

1864 1»!.418 

18(55 ,       848,120 

1866 318,551 

1867 298.358 

186S 297.215 

1869 352,569 

Total  in  fourteen  years .2.918.213 

"Total  from  July  1,18 x>,  to  Juno  30.1860.  five  years. 
1,514.810." 

In  185G  the  rate  of  duty  on  the  aggregate  of 
our  imports  was  20.3,  and  the  number  of  immi- 
grants were  200,436  ;  in  1859  the  rate  of  duties 
had  been  reduced  to  14.6,  and  the  number  of 
immigrants  fell  to  121, '282.  In  1861,  by  the 
acts  of  March  2,  Augusts,  and  December  24  tho 
rate  of  duties  was  further  reduced  to  1 1  2.  This 
broke  the  camel's  back.  So  many  men  were 
thrown  out  of  employment  and  wages  sunk  so 
low  that  none  but  agriculturists  could  come  to 
us  with  any  prospect  of  improving  their  condi- 
tion, and  immigration  sunk  to  a  point  lower 
than  it  had  been  since  the  ever-to-be-remem- 
bered free-trade  crisis  of  1837-40.  In  that  year 
but  91,920  immigrants  arrived,  and  the  depres- 
sion continued  through,  the  next  year  and  the 
number  of  immigrants  was  but  91,987.  By  the 
act  of  July  14,.  1862  the  duties  were  raised,  so 
that  in  1863  they  were  up  to  23.7,  and  the  im- 
migration nearly  equaled  that  of  the  two  pre- 
ceding years,  having  gone  up  176,282.  By  the 
several  acts  ef  1864,  1865,  and  1866  the  duties 
were  increased,  so  that  the  duties  on  the  import  • 
ations  of  1866  averaged  40.2  per  cent.,  and  im  • 
migration  went  up  to  318,564.  Last  year,  when 
the  West  was  further  oppressed  by  the  increase 
of  duties  on  wool  and  copper,  they  averaged 4L  2, 
and  the  number  of  immigrants  went  up  to 
35?, 569 ;  and  the  commissioners  of  immigra- 


: 


23 


tion  assure  us  that  this  year  the  number  will 
exceed  400,000. 

It  is  thns  demonstrated  historically  that  pre- 
cisely as  we  make  our  duties  protective  of  high 
wages  for  labor,  so  do  we  bring  skilled  work- 
men from  Germany,  Belgium,  France,  and  j 
England  to  work  in  our  mines,  forges,  fur- 
naces, rolling-mills,  cotton  and  woolen  facto- 
ries, and  create  a  home  market  for  the  gram 
of  Iowa,  Illinois,  and  the  other  States  whose 
farmers  complain  that  they  have  no  market 
for  their  grain. 

SKILLED  WORKMEN"  THE   MOST  VALUABLE  COMMODITY 
WE  CAX  IMPOIJT. 

Mr.  SCHENCK.  We  have  free  trade  in 
men. 

Mr.  KELLEY.  The  chairman  of  the  Com- 
mittee of  Ways  and  Means  [Mr.  SCHEXCK] 
suggests  in  this  connection  that  we  have  free 
trade  in  men.  Yes,  men  are  on  the  free  list. 
They  cost  us  not  even  freight.  Yet  how  they 
swell  the  revenues  and  help  us  pay  tho  debt  of 
the  country !  They  are  raised  from  helpless 
infancy,  through  tender  childhood,  and  trained 
to  skilled  labor  in  youth  in  other  lands,  and  in 
manhood  allured  by  higher  wages,  they  come 
to  us  and  are  welcomed  to  citizenship.  In  this 
way  we  have  maintained  a  balance  of  trade  that 
has  enabled  us  to  resist  without  bankruptcy  the 
ordinary  commercial  balance  that  has  been  so 
heavily  against  us.  We  promote  free  trade  in 
men,  and  it  is  the  only  free  trade  I  am  prepared 
to  promote. 

FEEXCH  FEEE  TKADE. 

The  French  tariff  is  as  inimical  to  us  as  that 
of  England.  It  is  replete  with  prohibitory 
duties  and  absolute  prohibitions.  Yet  France 
is  spoken  of  to  us  by  the  English  journals  and 
in  the  declamations  of  gentlemen  as  a  free-trade 
nation.  Why,  sir,  on  every  article  mentioned 
in  the  French  tariff,  unless  it  is  absolutely  free, 
the  duty  is  so  much  if  imported  iu  French  ves- 
sels, and  so  much  more  if  imported  in  vessels 
of  other  nations.  Every  head  of  acoluinn of  the 
rates  of  duty  established  by  the  French  tariff 
shows  that  you  cannot  import  dutiable  articles 
into  France  at  the  same  rate  in  the  vessel  of 
another  nation  that  you  can  in  a  French  one. 
They  read  thus : 


Articles. 


Mr.  ALLISON.  Are  you  in  favor  of  that 
rule? 

Mr.  KELLEY.     I  am. 

Mr.  ALLISON.     So  am  I. 

Mr.  KELLEY.  I  am  in  favor  of  imposing 
duties  so  as  to  discriminate  in  favor  of  American 
shipping.  I  am  for  every  form  of  protection 
to  American  industry  and  enterprise. 


General  tariff. 

Import  tariff  in  treaty 
with  Great   Britain 
and  other  countries. 

Imports. 

In  French 
and  treaty 
vessels. 

In  other 
vessels. 

In 
French 
vessels. 

In 
other 

vessels. 

In  the  French  tariff  tobacco  is  classed  as  a 
colonial  product,  and  its  importation  on  private 
account  is  prohibited.  It  is  a  Government 
monopoly.  American  grown  tobacco,  even  in 
the  leaf,  K  admitted  into  France  only  when  the 
colonial  supply  fails ;  and  then  if  it  is  carried 
in  other  than  a  French  vessel  it  is  made  to  pay 
a  duty  of  nearly  1  cent  on  the  pound,  which  is 
imposed  in  order  to  tax  foreign  shipping. 

The  gentleman  from  Iowa  objects  to  the 
schedule  under  which  duties  are  to  be  assessed 
under  the  committee's  bill,  and  specially  to  that 
of  sugar.  Let  me  invite  his  attention  to  some 
of  the  provisions  of  the  French  tariff  on  sugar : 
sugar  from  other  than  French  possessions ; 
sugar  similar  to  refined  powdered,  above  No. 
20,  from  foreign  countries,  &c.;  sugar,  refined, 
from  other  possessions,  are  prohibited.  Thus 
all  sugars  refined  or  advanced  in  other  than 
French  possessions  are  prohibited,  as  is  also 
molasses. 

Mr.  SCHENCK.  That  has  built  up  their 
beet-sugar  manufacture. 

Mr.  KELLEY.  Yes  ;  and  it  is  an  industry 
we  should  build  up  in  the  West.  I  want  to  run 
cursorily  through  this  tariff.  The  importation 
of  cast  iron  into  France  is  prohibited.  Wrought 
iron  in  plates  is  prohibited.  Manufactures  of 
iron  of  certain  kinds  are  prohibited.  All  chem- 
ical products  not  enumerated  are  prohibited. 
All  extracts  of  dye-woods  are  prohibited.  Dye- 
woods  art  admitted  free  ;  but  if  American  or 
other  labor  has  been  expended  in  making  ex- 
tracts from  dye-woods  the  extracts  are  prohib- 
ited. Gentlemen  of  the  free-trade  school  gen- 
erally and  the  gentlemen  from  New  York  [Mr. 
BROOKS]  and  from  Iowa  [Mr.  ALLISOX]  assail 
vehemently,  and  as  I  think  most  unfairly,  the 
iron  schedule  and  duties  on  steel  proposed  by 
the  committee's  bill.  How  differently  France 
estimates  the  importance  of  these  vital  indus- 
tries. Her  tariff  prohibits  all  manufactures  of 
zinc  and  other  metals  not  specially  named  and 
the  following  articles  of  iron  and  steel,  in  the 
production  of  which  we  excel  both  her  and 
England  in  quality  and  cheapness : 

"Castings,  not  polished:  chairs  for  railroads, 
plates,  itc.,  cast  in  open  air;  cylindric  tubes,  plain 
or  grooved  columns,  gas-retorts,  &R.,  and  other 
articles  without  ornament  or  finish;  hollow-ware 
not  included  above;  castings,  polished  or  turned; 
the  same,  tinned,  varnished,  <fcc. ;  household  uten- 
sils and  other  articles  not  enumerated,  of  iron  or 
sheet  iron,  polished  or  painted;  game,  enameled  or 
varnished;  all  articles  of  steel:  iron,  blacksmiths' 
work;  locksmiths'  work ;  nails,  by  machine;  nails, 
by  hand;  wood-screws,  bolts,  screw-nuts." 

France  prohibits  and  excludes  these  articles 
that  her  poorly  paid  workmen  may  be  protected 
against  the  productions  of  those  of  Belgium 
and  Germany,  who  receive  even  less  than  they. 
All  tissues  of  cotton,  except  nankeens,  pro- 
duce of  India,  lace,  manufactured  by  hand  or 
otherwise,  and  tulle,  with  lace-work,  are  also 
prohibited.  Cotton  and  woolen  yarns  are  also 
prohibited  by  the  general  tariff,  though  admitted 
at  high  and  most  scientifically  rated  protective 
duties  from  England  under  the  import  tariff 
treaty  with  that  country. 


Yes,  sir,  if  we  spin  our  cotton  into  yarn,  or 
weave  it  into  a  tissue  or  fabric,  it  is  excluded 
from  the  broad  empire  of  France.  If  you  carry 
it  there  raw,  with  no  labor  in  it  save  that  of  the 
slave  or  the  freedman,  you  can  take  it  in,  but  as 
yarn  or  a  tissue  it  is  prohibited. 

THE  PURPOSE  OF  THE  FEEE  LIST. 
The  committee  in  proposing  the  extended  free 
list  embraced  in  the  second  section  of  the  bill 
hoped  to  accomplish  two  important  objects,  one 
of  which  was  to  promote  direct  commerce  be- 
tween us  and  those  non- manufacturing  coun- 
tries which  require  the  productions  of  our  shops 
and  mills,  and  whose  raw  materials  we  require ; 
and  the  other  was  to  give  our  manufacturers 
and  mechanics,  free  of  duty,  those  essentials 
which  France,  England, and  Belgium  admit  free. 
A  majority  of  the  committee  believe  that  the 
adoption  of  this  will  do  much  to  revive  our 
commerce,  and  not  only  quicken  established 
industries,  but  lead  to  the  introduction  of 
new  ones,  and  thus  increase  the  market  for 
the  productions  of  the  farm  and  reduce  the 
cost  and  price  of  a  large  range  of  manufac- 
tured goods.  We  think  it  is  sound  policy 
to  let  in  free  raw  materials  that  we  cannot 
produce,  and  collect  our  revenue  from  articles 
in  the  production  of  which  labor  has  been 
expended.  This  is  the  theory  of  the  bill  we 
reported.  It  has  the  sanction  of  the  sagacity 
and  experience  of  France  and  England,  and 
was  framed  regardless  of  the  teachings  of  mere 
theorists  and  school-men. 

DUTIES  ON  WOOL  AND  WOOLEXS. 

Mr.  Chairman,  although  I  had  made  some 
preparation  for  its  illustration,  I  had  not 
expected  to  go  into  so  general  a  discussion  of 
the  effect  of  protection  upon  the  interests  of 
the  farmer.  The  wide  range  the  discussion 
has  taken  must  be  my  apology  for  one  other 
view  of  the  subject.  Ihe  gentleman  from 
Iowa  told  us  that  the  wool  interest  is  suffering 
from  the  excessive  duties  imposed  on  woolen 
cloths  by  the  existing  tariff,  and  that  the  com- 
mittee proposes  to  continue  them.  Sir,  I  may 
be  very  dull,  but  after  hearing  the  gentleman 
it  still  seems  to  me  that  the  wool  interest  must 
have  been  benefited  by  the  bill  increasing  the 
duties  on  wool  and  woolens.  We  certainly  have 
more  people  wearing  wool  now  than  we  had  in 
1860.  We  have,  as  I  have  shown,  received  over 
2,000,000  immigrants  since  then,  and  our 
natural  increase  is  at  least  1,000,000  per 
annum  ;  yet  I  find  by  the  thirteenth  report  of 
the  commissioners  of  her  Britannic  Majesty's 
customs  that  the  declared  value  of  woolen 
manufactures  exported  to  the  United  States 
was,  in  June,  1860,  £3,414,050,  while  in  1868, 
nearly  a  decade  thereafter,  it  was  £3,658,432 — 
an  increase  of  £234,382  in  8  years. 

Who  has  grown  the  wool  that  clothes  our  in- 
creased population  ?  Our  freedmen  now  wear 
ordinary  woolen  clothes.  The  "poor  whites" 
of  the  South  now  wear  what  they  call  "  store 
goods,"  but  to  which  they  were  unused  before 
the  rebellion.  The  cold  Northwest,  whose 


people  wear  woolen  goods  all  the  year,  has 
increased  its  population  so  largely  that  it  is 
demanding  enlarged  representation  on  this 
floor  without  waiting  for  the  census. 

Our  wool-wearing  population  has  nearly 
doubled  ;  yet  the  amount  of  wool  imported  is 
scarcely  greater  than  it  was  eight  years  ago. 
Where  does  the  wool  come  from  ?  Dues  it  drop 
gently  from  the  heavens,  like  thi>  dew,  or  is  it 
grown  upon  the  sheep  of  western  and  southern 
farmers  ? 

THE  WAY  TO  REDUCE  THE  TAXES. 

Sir,  I  am  as  anxious  to  reduce  taxes  as  rap- 
idly as  it  can  be  done  consistently  with  the 
maintenance  of  the  public  credit  and  the  grad- 
ual extinguishment  of  the  debt  as  any  man  on 
this  floor.  I  do  not  make  this  declaration  now 
for  the  first  time.  On  the  31st  of  January, 
18G6, 1  saw  that,  the  war  being  over,  the  freed- 
men must  be  provided  with  the  means  of  mak- 
ing a  living  by  other  labor  than  that  of  the 
plantation  hand  ;  that  the  women  of  the  South 
must  have  employment :  that  there  must  be  a 
diversification  of  our  industry ;  that  the  North- 
west would  be  shut  out  from  her  markets  if 
she  did  not  diversify  her  industry ;  and  in  the 
course  of  some  remarks  I  made  that  day  in 
favor  of  remitting  taxes,  both  internal  and 
external,  I  described  the  bill  now  under  con- 
sideration. In  stating  how  I  would  reduce  the 
burdens  of  the  people  I  said : 

"I  have  never  been  able  to  believe  that  a  national 
debt  is  a  national  blessing.  I  have  seen  how  good 
might  bo  interwoven  with  or  educed  from  evil,  or 
how  a  great  evil  might,  under  certain  conditions,  be 
turned  to  good  account;  but  beyond  this  I  have 
never  been  able  to  regard  debt,  individual  or  national, 
as  a  blessing.  It  may  be  that,  as  in  the  inscrutable 
providence  of  God  it  required  nearly  five  years  of 
war  to  extirpate  the  national  crime  of  slavery,  and 
anguish  and  grief  found  their  way  to  nearly  every 
hearth -side  in  the  country  before  we  would  recognize 
the  manhood  of  the  race  we  had  so  long  oppressed, 
it  was  also  necessary  that  we  should  be  invo|ved  in 
a  debt  of  unparalleled  magnitude  that  we  might  be 
compelled  to  avail  ourselves  of  the  wealth  that  lies 
so  freely  around  us,  and  by  opening  market-*  for  well- 
rewarded  industry  make  our  land,  what  in  theory  it 
has  ever  been,  the  refuge  of  the  oppressed  of  all 
climes.  England,  if  supreme  selfishness  buconsistent 
with  sagacity,  has  been  eminently  sagacious  in  pre- 
venting us  from  becoming  a  manufacturing  people; 
for  with  our  enterprise,  our  ingenuity,  our  freer  insti- 
tutions, the  extent  of  our  country,  the  cheapness  of 
our  land,  the  diversity  of  our  resources,  tho  grandeur 
of  our  seas,  lakes,  and  rivers,  we  should  long  ago 
have  been  able  to  offer  her  best  workmen  suuh 
inducements  as  would  have  brought  them  by  mil- 
lions to  help  bear  our  burdens  and  fight  our  battles. 
We  can  thus  raise  the  standard  of  British  and  conti- 
nental wages  and  protect  American  workmen  against 
ill-paid  competition.  This  we  must  do  if  we  mean  to 
maintain  the  national  honor.  The  fields  now  under 
culture,  tho  houses  now  existing,  the  mines  now 
being  worked,  the  men  we  now  employ,  cannot  pay 
our  debt.  To  meet  its  annual  interest  by  taxing  our 
present  population  and  developed  resources  would 
be  to  continue  an  ever-enduring  burden. 

"  The  principal  of  the  debt  must  be  paid;  but  as  it 
was  contracted  for  posterity  its  extinguishment 
should  not  impoverish  those  who  sustained  tho  bur- 
dens of  thewar.  lamnotanxioustoreduce  thetotal 
of  our  debt,  and  would  in  this  respect  follow  the 
example  of  England,  and  as  its  amount  has  been 
fixed  would  not  for  the  present  trouble  myself  about 
its  aggregate  except  to  prevent  its  increase.  Mu 
anxiety  it  that  the  taxet  it  involve*  shall  be  an  little 
oppressive  as  possible,  and  be  so  adjueted  that  while 


25 


defending  our  industry  against  foreign  assault,  they  may 
add  nothing  to  the  cost  of  those  necessaries  of  life  which, 
we  cannot  produce,  and  for  which  ice  must  therefore 
look  to  other  lands.  The  raw  materials  entering  into 
our  manufactures,  which  we  are  yet  unable  to  produce, 
but  on  which  weunwisely  impose  duties,  I  would  put  into 
the  free  list \oith  tea,  coffee,  and  other  such  purely  for- 
eign essentials  of  life,  and  would  impose  duties  on  com- 
modities that  compete  with  American  productions,  so  as 
to  protect  every  feeble  or  infant  branch  of  industry  and 
quicken  those!  hat  are  robust.  I  would  thus  cheapen  the 
elements  of  life  and  enable  those  whose  capital  is  em- 
barked in  any  branch  of  production  to  offer  such  wages  to 
the  skilled  workmen  of  all  lands  as  would  steadily  and 
rapidly  increase  our  numbers,  and,  as  is  always  the  case 
in  the  neighborhood  of  growing  cities  or  towns  of  con- 
siderable extent,  increase  the  return  for  farm  labor; 
this  policy  would  open  new  mines  and  quarries,  build 
new  furnaces,  forges,  and  factories,  and  rapidly  in- 
crease the  taxable  property  and  taxable  inhabitants 
of  the  country. 

"JLet  us  pursue  for  twenty  years  thesound  national 
policy  of  protection,  and  we  will  double  pur  popula- 
tion and  more  than  quadruple  pur  capital  and  re- 
duce our  indebtedness  per  capita  and  per  acre  to 
little  more  than  a  nominal  sum.  Thus  each  man 
can  'without  moneys'  pay  the  bulk  of  his  portion 
of,  the  debt  by  blessing  others  with  the  ability  to 
bear  an  honorable  burden." 

My  views  on  these  points  have  undergone 
no  change,  and  I  cannot  more  aptly  describe 
the  bill  before  the  committee,  in  general  terms, 
than  I  thus  did  more  than  four  years  ago. 

THE  DEFECTS  OF  THE  PRESENT  TARIFF  AND  THE  EEil- 
BDIE3  SUGGESTED  BY  THE  NEW  BILL. 

Why  not  maintain  the  existing  tariff,  and 
wherein  dees  the  bill  submitted  by  the  Com- 
mittee of  Ways  and  Means  differ  from  it? 
Several  gentlemen  have  propounded  these 
questions,  and  I  now  propose  to  answer  them 
briefly  and  rapidly.  The  existing  law  is  crude 
and  contains  many  incongruous  provisions. 
It  is  not  in  accord  with  the  theory  of  the  free- 
trader or  the  protectionist.  It  imposes  the 
heaviest  duties  on  articles  of  common  consump- 
tion that  we  cannot  produce.  Thus,  on  chalk, 
uot  an  inch  of  which  has,  so  far  as  I  have  heard, 
been  discovered  in  our  country,  it  imposes  a 
duty  of  833J  per  cent.  It  is  bought  at  from 
75  cents  to  $1  50  per  ton,  and  the  duty  is  $10. 
This  onerous  duty  is  not  protective.  We  have 
no  chalk-fields,  and  produce  no  substitute  for 
it.  It  is  therefore  simply  a  tax,  and  one  that 
everybody  feels  ;  the  boy  at  his  game  of  mar- 
bles, or  before  the  blackboard  in  school,  the 
housewife  when  she  cleans  her  silver  or  bri- 
tannia  ware,  and  the  farmer  in  the  cost  of  putty 
for  his  windows.  The  new  bill  puts  chalk  on 
the  free  list. 

Mr.  ALLISON.  Have  we  not  increased  the 
duty  on  putty,  which  enters  into  use  in  the 
house  of  every  citizen  in  the  land? 

Mr.  KELLEY.  Yes,  sir ;  and  why  did  we 
doit?  All  our  western  farmers  are  raising 
wheat,  and  many  of  them  can  find  no  market 
for  their  crop,  and  this  bill,  it  is  hoped,  will,  if  it 
become  a  law,  induce  some  of  them  to  produce 
other  things.  We  import  immense  amounts  of 
linseed  and  castor-oil,  and  the  majority  of  the 
committee  hoped  that  by  raising  the  duty  on 
these  oils,  and  those  which  may  be  substituted 
for  them,  it  would  induce  some  of  them  to 
raise  flax  and  manufacture  the  oil.  Again,  we 


import  great  quantities  of  goods  made  of  flax 
and  substitutes  for  it,  and  we  hoped  that  bet- 
ter duties  on  the  oil  and  on  these  fabrics  might 
lead  to  the  establishment  of  linen  and  other 
mills  in  the  interior.  And  as  linseed-oil  is  the 
ingredient  of  chief  value  in  putty,  we  raised  the 
duty  on  it  to  correspond  with  that  on  oil.  We 
hope  thus  to  secure  to  every  citizen  good  and 
cheap  putty,  made  of  free  chalk  and  American- 
grown  oil. 

THE  ALLEGATION  THAT  WE  PROTECT  OUR  MANUFAC- 
TURES BY  DUTIES  AVERAGING  FORTY  PER  CENT.  IS 
NOT  TBUE. 

Mr.  Chairman,  I  desire  to  call  attention  to 
the  unfairness,  unintentional  of  course,  of  the 
statement  of  the  gentleman  from  New  York 
[Mr.  BROOKS]  that  the  existing  tariff  givea 
protection  equal  to  an  average  of  41.2  percent. 
That  is  the  percentage  of  duties  on  the  aggre- 
gate of  our  imports,  and  he  will  hardly  claim 
that  the  duty  of  over  833  per  cent,  on  chalk  is 
protective  of  any  of  our  industries. 

Again,  we  collect  a  duty  of  300  per  cent, 
on  pepper.  Why  should  black  pepper  pay  300 
per  cent.  ?  Do  we  grow  it  anywhere  in  this 
country  ?  Is  this  duty  protective  of  any  of  our 
industries  ?  You  pay  5  cents  a  pound  for  pep- 
per and  the  tariff  imposes  a  duty  of  15  cents, 
gold,  equal  to  300  per  cent.,  and  the  gentle- 
man includes  this  in  his  average  of  protective 
duties.  Do  we  grow  cloves  or  clove-stems  in 
any  part  of  the  country?  Is  the  duty  on  them 
protective?  It  is  on  cloves  355  per  cent,  and 
on  clove-stems  386  per  cent.,  and  yet  the  gen- 
tleman also  includes  these  with  his  protective 
duties.  I  think  gentlemen  perceive  by  this 
time  what  I  meant  when  I  said  that  many  of 
the  provisions  of  the  present  tariff  are  incon- 
gruous. While  many  of  them  are  high  enough 
for  protection  they  are  countervailed  by  higher 
duties  on  raw  materials  that  we  cannot  pro- 
duce, and  which  rival  nations  admit  free  or 
under  very  low  duties. 

I  shall  not  attempt  to  bring  all  such  incongru- 
ities to  the  attention  of  the  committee,  but  beg 
leave  to  allude  to  a  few  more.  On  cayenne  pep- 
per, the  duty  is  303  per  cent.;  on  allspice,  376 £ 
per  cent. ;  on  nutmegs,  188  J  per  cent. ;  on  crude 
camphor,  118  per  cent.;  on  saltpeter,  77£  per 
cent.;  on  varnish  gums,  none  of  which  are  pro- 
duced in  this  country,  80  per  cent.;  on  tea,  the 
laborer's  refreshing  drink,  78  J  percent.:  on  cof- 
fee, 47  J  per  cent.  I  could  largely  extend  this  list 
of  duties,  each  of  which  is  a  tax  on  some  article 
of  common  consumption  not  produced  in  the 
country,  and  to  that  extent  a  bonus  to  our  com- 
petitors. I  am  in  favor  of  making  all  such  arti- 
cles free ;  and  the  committee  has  reduced  the 
duties  on  them  or  put  them  on  the  free  list. 
When  this  shall  be  done  the  gentleman  from 
New  York  can  calculate  the  percentage  and  find 
that  our  duties  will  compare  favorably  with 
those  imposed  by  England  and  France. 

DUTIES  WHICH  NEED  READJUSTMENT. 

Another  serious  fault  of  the  existing  law  is 
that  so  many  of  its  duties  are  ad  valorem. 
Dishonest  men  take  advantage  of  this  and  have 


26 


goods  invoiced  below  the  proper  value,  and 
thus  not  only  defraud  the  Government,  but  do 
wrong  to  both  the  home  manufacturer  and  the 
honest  importer.  This  system  of  duties  has 
much  to  do  with  the  decline  of  American  com- 
merce. The  large  temptation  to  defraud  the 
Government  by  undervaluation  has  caused 
great  houses  abroad  to  establish  agencies  here 
and  to  refuse  to  sell  directly  to  an  American 
purchaser.  This  is  so  with  all  the  Sheffield 
steel-uiakers  and  most  of  the  continental  silk 
houses.  In  this  way  the  frauds  of  the  steel- 
makers and  silk  manufacturers  have  been 
enormous,  amounting  to  many  millions  of  dol- 
lars. The  new  bill  substitutes  specific  duties 
wherever  it  is  practicable. 

The  duties  now  collected  on  alcoholic  prep- 
arations, and  those  in  the  production  of  which 
spirits  are  used,  such  as  quinine,  chloroform, 
collodion,  &c.,  are  now  much  too  high,  having 
been  adjusted  to  the  tax  of  $2  per  gallon  on 
distilled  spirits.  The  new  bill  adjusts  them  to 
the  lower  tax  now  collected. 

Many  of  tho  existing  duties  are  so  high  as  to 
defeat  all  their  legitimate  objects  and  deprive 
the  Government  of  all  revenue.  This  is  espe- 
cially true  of  spices.  It  was  in  evidence  from 
many  sources  that  these  are  imported  into 
New  York  or  San  Francisco  and  immediately 
shipped  in  bond  to  the  British  provinces, 
whence  they  are  smuggled  back.  The  bill  of 
the  committee  proposes  such  reductions  of 
the  duties  as  will  probably  give  the  Govern- 
ment a  handsome  revenue  while  cheapening 
them  to  the  consumer.  The  value  to  the  coun- 
try of  the  changes  proposed  cannot  fail  to  be 
very  great. 

THE    PRESENT    LAW  SHOULD  BE  EEVISED.  NOT  OVER- 
THROWN. 

Would  that  I  could  impress  upon  the  House 
my  estimate  of  the  value  to  the  country  of 
these  changes.  I  am  discussing  the  bill  in  no 
spirit  of  partisanship.  In  urging  its  accept- 
ance I  am  pleading  the  cause  of  the  farmer 
and  laborer,  as  1  conscientiously  believe  that 
it  will,  if  adopted,  increase  the  purchasing 
power,  the  exchangeable  value  of  every  bushel 
of  grain  grown  and  hour  of  labor  performed 
in  our  country.  I  have  no  general  condemna- 
tion for  the  existing  law.  It  needs  revision, 
but  should  not  be  overthrown.  As  a  revenue 
measure  it  has  exceeded  the  anticipations  of 
its  friends  and  the  most  earnest  friends  of  the 
Government.  It  yielded  for  the  year  ending 
June  80, 1867,  $176.417,810 ;  for  the  year  end- 
ing June  30,  18G8,  $164,464,599  66 ;  and  for 
the  year  ending  June  30, 1869,  $180,084,456  C3 ; 
and  no  preceding  tariff  produced  results  com- 
parable to  these. 

And,  eir,  notwithstanding  these  faults  it  has 
been  of  great  value  as  a  protective  measure. 
By  its  protective  influence  it  has  added  much 
to  the  power  of  the  country  and  the  prosperity 
of  the  people.  Under  it  our  production  of  pig 
iron  has  been  more  than  doubled,  as  I  have 
already  shown,  and  its  production  has  been 
extended  into  new  and  large  fields  in  States 


where  it  was  previously  unknown.  Thus  has 
increased  value  been  given  to  all  the  land  in  those 
States ;  the  increase  being  equal  to  the  addition 
of  the  value  of  the  mineral  lands  to  that  of 
the  agricultural  surface ;  and  more  than  that, 
it  has  provided  a  market  in  the  neighborhood 
of  each  furnace,  in  which  articles  can  be  sold 
which  would  not  bear  transportation  to  distant 
points  or  foreign  lands.  The  farmers  of  Iowa 
and  Minnesota  now  produce  for  sale  little  of 
anything  else  than  wheat  and  wool  for  export- 
ation to  the  sea-board  States  or  elsewhere. 
When  manufactories  are  built  or  mines  opened, 
villages  spring  up  and  create  a  market  for  roots, 
as  potatoes  and  turnips,  the  productions  of  the 
garden  and  the  orchard,  and  for  hay,  by  which 
the  western  farmer  will  be  relieved  from  the 
necessity  of  growing  successive  crops  of  wheat 
to  the  exhaustion  of  the  soil.  These  villages 
also  afford  a  market  for  lamb,  veal,  eggs,  and 
all  the  thousand  things  that  come  in  as  subsid- 
iary sources  of  income  even  to  those  who  farm 
on  a  great  scale.  Thus  have  many  farmers  felt 
the  protective  influence  of  the  existing  tariff, 
as  well  as  in  the  stimulus  it  has  given  to  im- 
migration, and  the  addition  of  the  mineral  to 
the  agricultural  value  of  immense  bodies  of 
land  in  almost  every  State  ;  and  while  endeav- 
oring to  improve  it  I  renew  my  protest  against 
its  repeal  or  overthrow. 

TOE    CAREFUL    CONSIDERATION   THAT    HAS    I'P.EN   BE- 
STOWED UPON  TUB  BILL  BY  TUB  COMMIT 

Mr.  Chairman  and  gentlemen  of  the  commit- 
tee, your  Committee  of  Ways  and  Means  have 
devoted  the  earnest  labor  of  a  year  to  the  con- 
sideration of  the  revision  of  the  tariff,  a  duty 
you  committed  to  them  by  special  resolution 
of  the  House.  In  the  discharge  of  that  duty 
we  have  traveled  in  great  part  at  our  own  proper 
cost,  relieved  largely  by  the  hospitality  of  rail- 
road, steamship,  and  other  transportation  com- 
panies, from  the  rocky  coasts  of  Massachu- 
setts, and  the  waters  of  its  bay,  along  the  long 
coast  of  California  and  Oregon,  and  over  the 
beautiful  waters  of  Puget  sound,  the  Willa- 
mette and  the  Columbia  rivers ;  we  have  list- 
ened to  merchants,  manufacturers,  farmers,  and 
men  of  enterprise,  representing  all  the  interests 
of  every  section  of  the  country ;  and  we  have 
been  in  all  respects  painstaking  and  deliberate  in 
our  efforts  to  ascertain  how  the  existing  provis- 
ions of  the  tariff  can  be  so  modified  as  to  yield  the 
Government  adequate  revenue,  lighten  the  bur- 
dens of  tho  people,  and  stimulate  all  tkeir  in- 
dustries with  equal  hand.  And  I  conscientiously 
believe  that  if  the  bill  we  have  reported  should 
be  adopted  without  an  amendment,  except 
those  the  committee  is  prepared  to  suggest,  its 
quickening  influence  would  be  felt  in  every 
department  of  the  productive  and  commercial 
industries  of  the  country.  It  would  do  much 
to  revivify  the  languishing  shipping  interest. 
It  would  give  new  andgrander  proportions  to  the 
market  for  your  agricultural  products.  It  would 
maintain  in  a  healthy  condition  your  manu- 
facturing and  mechanical  establishments,  and 
it  would  say  to  capitalists  here  and  abroad, 


27 


"  The  protective  policy  of  the  country  is  con- 
firmed ;  you  may  safely  embark  in  new  enter- 
prises and  develop  new  elements  of  the  illim- 
itable store  and  varieties  of  wealth  now  lying 
dormant  within  the  country." 

HOW  IT  WILL  STIMULATE  TUB  SHIPPING  IXTEBEST. 

Do  gentlemen  ask  how  it  will  quicken  com- 
merce? Let  them  turn  to  its  free  list.  Our 
commerce  is  now  with  manufacturing  nations 
inhabiting  the  grain-growing  and  metalliferous 
regions  of  Europe.  They  produce  everything 
we  do  except  cotton,  rice,  tobacco,  and  petro- 
leum ;  other  than  these  they  want  but  little 
from  us,  unless  war  or  drought  or  excessive 
rain  prevails  over  so  large  a  section  as  to  ma- 
terially diminish  the  grain  crop.  We  should 
cultivate  an  exchange  of  products  with  the  non- 
manufacturing  tropical  or  semi-tropical  conn 
tries.  We  want  their  gums,  spices,  barks, 
ivory,  dye-woods,  drugs,  and  overproductions 
which  they  would  gladly  exchange  for  our  grain , 
spirits,  cotton  fabrics,  axes,  hoes,  shovels,  and 
an  infinite  variety  of  our  productions.  These 
countries  are  our  natural  markets,  but  we  have 
excluded  ourselves  from  them  by  our  tariff 
laws.  All  other  manufacturing  countries  admit 
their  productions  free,  while  we  impose  duties 
on  them  which,  as  I  have  shown,  are  taxes  upon 
ourselves  in  their  consumption.  But  this  does 
a  further  wrong  to  the  shipping  interest  in  this 
wise:  the  London  merchant  gets  their  produc- 
tion in  exchange  for  the  shoddy  cloth,  low-grade 
iron,  and  general  "Brumanagen"  wares  of 
England,  and  imports  them  free  of  duty.  He 
ships  them  to  us  in  English  steamers,  and  adds 
freight  to  his  many  other  profits.  This  trade 
of  right  belongs  to  us,  and  under  the  commit- 
tee's bill  we  will  enjoy  it. 

Let  me  illustrate  by  a  single  example.  The 
cost  of  saltpeter  is  a  question  of  importance  to 
every  railroad  builder,  quarryman,  and  miner, 
and  we  ought  to  import  the  raw  material  from 
two  countries  remote  from  each  other  and 
manufacture  it  more  cheaply  than  we  now 
import  it  through  London  from  India.  The 
duties  on  this  article  are  higher  than  they 
shouldbe,  and  soapportioned  as  to  discriminate 
against  our  labor.  That  on  the  crude  article 
is  25  per  cent,  higher  than  that  on  the  par- 
tially refined,  and  is  at  the  rate  of  77f  per  cent. 
They  are  as  follows  :  on  partially  refined  salt- 
peter, 2  cents  per  pound  ;  on  crude,  2£  cents, 
and  on  refined,  3  cents.  The  new  bill  removes 
the  discrimination  against  ourselves  and  makes 
but  two  grades  of  duty.  It  reduces  that  on  the 
crude  article  to  I }  cent,  and  on  the  refined  to 
2-J  cents.  But  while  thus  reducing  the  duty  on 
this  important  article  the  bill  of  the  committee 
invites  the  establishment  of  its  cheaper  manu- 
facture in  our  midst  and  the  employment  of 
many  ships  in  bringing  us  tho  raw  material  in 
equal  proportions  from  Peru  and  Germany. 

'If  gentlemen  will  examine  the  free  list  they 
will  find  that  it  embraces  muriate  of  potassa 
and  nitrate  of  soda.  The  latter  is  a  natural 
product  of  Peru,  and  the  former  of  Germany, 


and  from  1,000  tons  of  each  we  can  produce 
1,000  tons  of  saltpeter  cheaper  than  we  can 
import  it  from  India.  This  would  double  the 
tonnage  required  for  the  carrying  of  this  arti- 
cle. I  have  thus  presented  to  the  committee 
but  one  of  many  illustrations  with  which  I 
might  detain  them  of  the  influence  the  bill  will 
exercise  upon  our  commerce  if  it  becomes  a 
law. 

STEEL  AD  VALOREM. 

I  have  said  that  one  of  the  defects  of  the 
present  law  is  its  frequent  application  of  ad 
valorems,  which  open  the  door  to  great  frauds. 
I  turn  for  an  illustration  to  what  seems  to  be 
a  favorite  topic  of  the  gentleman  from  Iowa, 
[Mr.  ALLISON] — the  article  of  steel.  The  gen- 
tleman said  the  duty  on  steel  in  ingots,  bars, 
sheets,  and  wire  above  a  certain  thickness  is  2£ 
cents,  and  that  we  had  raised  it  to  3}  cents, 
while  reducing  the  duty  a  little  on  less  important 
classes  of  steel.  Let  me  state  the  case  fairly. 
The  present  duty  on  ingots,  bars,  sheet,  and  wire 
not  less  than  one  quarter  of  an  inch  in  diameter, 
valued  at  7  cents  per  pound  or  less,  is  2J  cents 
per  pound ;  value  7  and  not  above  11  cents  per 
pound,  3  cents  per  pound;  valued  above  11  cents 
a  pound,  3£  cents  per  pound  and  10  per  cent. 
ad  valorem.  The  gentleman  attempted  to  dis- 
credit the  evidence  which  proves  the  magnitude 
of  the  frauds  persistently  perpetrated  by  the 
Sheffield  steel  makers  for  the  last  twentyyears 
under  this  system  ;  but  the  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury  is  acting  upon  it,  and  is  largely  increas- 
ing the  revenues  of  the  country  from  steel  by 
requiring  it  to  be  honestly  invoiced. 

Much  evidence,  confirmed  by  the  admission 
of  one  of  the  firms  engaged  in  it,  establish  the 
fact  that  a  combination  has  existed  among  these 
wealthy  Englishmen  to  sell  no  steel  in  England 
to  Americans,  but  send  it  to  agents  in  this  coun- 
try for  sale,  and  to  so  undervalue  it  that  that 
which  should  pay  3}  cents  and  10  per  cent. 
ad  valorem  has,  to  the  extent  of  9  pounds  out 
of  every  10,  been  undervalued  and  brought  in 
at  3  cents,  and  by  the  same  fraudulent  device 
and  conspiracy  the  greater  part  of  that  which 
was  subject  to  a  duty  of  3  cents  has  come  in 
at2J. 

Thus  the  Government  has  been  defrauded 
of  many  millions  of  revenue.  Now,  what  has 
the  committee  done  in  the  premises  ?  We  have 
agreed  to  put  all  steel — that  which  was  below 
and  that  which  was  above,  that  which  paid 
2^  cents  a  pound  and  that  which  paid  5J 
cents  a  pound,  or  3£  cents  and  10  per  cent,  ad 
valorem — under  a  duty  of  3J  cents  per  pound. 
We  had  steel  importers  and  steel  manufactur- 
ers and  experts  before  us,  and  they  all  agreed 
that  there  was  no  conceivable  test  by  which 
examiners  and  inspectors  of  customs  could 
distinguish  between  steel  worth  from  4  to  7  cents 
and  that  worth  more  than  11  cents  a  pound;  so 
that  though  we  may  thereby  for  a  brief  time  do 
some  injustice  to  those  who  use  low-priced 
steel  and  those  who  produce  high  qualities  of 
•steel  we  have  made  a  single  duty,  which  will 


28 


give  us  honest  revenue  and  enable  pur  steel 
manufacturers  to  live  and  extend  their  works. 

In  my  recent  remarks  on  Mr.  Wells's  report 
I  quoted  the  language  of  the  senior  partner  of 
a  steel-making  firm  in  Sheffield,  England,  in 
which  he  admitted  the  fact  of  undervaluation, 
and  declared  that  while  the  law  remains  as  it 
is  the  Government  will  be  defrauded  and  can- 
not prevent  it.  Thus  the  honest  men  among 
the  English  steel-makers  implore  us  to  close 
the  door  against  fraud  in  which  they  must  par- 
ticipate, or  surrender  our  market  to  their  less 
honest  neighbors.  Yet,  for  our  well-devised 
effort  to  do  justice  to  the  Government  and 
honest  importers,  we  are  denounced  as  taxing 
the  people  to  build  up  monopolies ! 

The  gentleman  from  Iowa  will  I  am  sure 
pardon  me  for  correcting  a  statement  of  his,  on 
which  he  amplified  somewhat  to-day  touching 
steel-manufacturing  in  Pittsburg.  The  state- 
ment he  read  yesterday  was  not  that  her  steel- 
makers were  able  to  compete  with  England  in 
1859 ;  it  was  that  steel- making  in  that  city  first 
became  an  assured  success  in  that  year.  Her 
enterprising  men  of  capital  had  for  many  years 
been  renewing  the  yet  fruitless  experiment. 
Man  after  man  and  firm  after  firm  had  failed. 
Steel- works  depreciated  in  value  and  new  firms 
bought  the  stock  and  premises  of  old  ones  at 
reduced  values,  till,  in  1859,  "an  assured  suc- 
cess was  attained."  This  was  the  phrase  the 
gentleman  from  Iowa  used  yesterday  when  he 
had  the  paper  before  him. 

STEPHEN  COLWELI.. 

I  am  quite  sure  that  he  would  not  intention- 
ally misstate  a  fact.  Nobody  values  him  more 
highly  than  I  do.  He  is  as  earnest  on  his  side 
of  this  gre:it  question  as  I  am  on  mine,  and  we 
are  both  of  a  temperament  that  requires  us  to 
have  the  figures  before  us  to  prevent  a  certain 
measure  of  exaggeration  in  our  statements. 
There  is,  however,  one  point  on  which  I  am 
disposed  to  quarrel  with  him,  and  that  is  that 
he  should  have  assumed  to  have  found  an  ally 
in  my  venerable  friend,  Stephen  Colwell,  and 
by  a  perversion  of  his  language  made  him  seem 
to  plead  against  protection  for  American  labor 
when  the  very  words  he  quoted  were  written  in 
its  behalf.  Sir,  Stephen  Colwell' s  life  has  been 
devoted  to  his  country.  It  has  been  a  life-long 
labor  of  love  with  him  to  promote  the  develop- 
ment of  her  vast  stores  of  wealth  and  the  pros- 
perity of  her  farmers  and  laborers.  He  was 
the  friend  and  companion  of  Frederick  List, 
the  founder  of  the  German  Zollverein,  who  was 
for  a  few  years  an  exile  from  his  native  land 
and  a  dweller  in  the  then  undeveloped  coal 
regions  of  Pennsylvania.  After  his  death  Mr. 
Colwell  collected  his  writings  and  found  pleas- 
ure in  editing  them ;  he  has  also  written  and 
published  much  in  defense  of  protection  as  a 
sure  means  of  promoting  national  greatness, 
cheap  commodities,  and  the  prosperity  of  the 
people ;  and  I  confess  that  I  was  both  astonished 
and  grieved  that  a  portion  of  an  article  of  Mr. 
Colwell'a  demanding  the  repeal  of  internal  tax-  < 


ation,  and"  showing  that  it  is  a  bonns  to  foreign 
manufacturers  and  a  burden  upon  our  home 
producers,  should  be  quoted  by  the  gentleman 
from  Iowa  against  the  tariff  bill,  and  to  prove 
that  protective  duties  add  to  the  cost  of  com- 
modities. I  know  my  friend  did  not  think  of 
the  wrong  he  was  doing,  but  it  is  not  just  to 
my  venerable  friend,  whose  life  is  drawing  to  ft 
close,  that  his  language  should  be  thus  perverted 
before  the  nation  whose  interest  he  has  done  so 
much  to  promote. 

THE  CLASSIFICATION  OF  IT.ON  NOT  SEW. 

But  the  gentleman  from  Iowa  asks  why  the 
classification  of  iron  found  in  the  bill  was 
adopted  by  the  committee.  I  will  tell  him  why. 
Sir,  so  far  as  classification  of  iron  has  been  mod- 
ified, and  the  changes  are  but  few,  they  adopt 
the  expressed  opinion  of  the  Senate  and  a 
former  Committee  of  Ways  and  Means. 

The  Senate  of  the  United  States,  on  the  31st 
of  January,  18G7,  passed  a  tariff  bill.  On  the 
18th  of  February  of  that  year  the  Committee 
of  Ways  and  Means  reported  it  to  this  House 
with  certain  amendments ;  and  your  commit- 
tee, finding  a  classification  indorsed  by  the  Sen- 
ate and  House,  followed  it,  except  where  they 
thought  change  necessary  or  judicious.  This 
is  the  classification  of  which  the  gentleman 
complains. 

lam  too  weary,  and  too  much  exhausted, 
and  your  patience  is  too  far  gone,  fur  me  to 
proceed  further  with  the  discussion  at  pres- 
ent. There  are  points  I  would  like  to  con- 
sider ;  but  I  must  draw  to  a  conclusion. 

PROOF  THAT  PHOTECTION  CHEAPENS  G(X)D.S. 

The  gentleman  from  Indiana,  [Mr.  Ki:r.r..] 
speaking  of  my  argument  on  Bessemer  rails, 
said  that  as  America  produced  but  80,000  tons 
per  annum,  the  establishment  of  her  works 
could  have  had  no  influence  upon  the  price  of 
English  rails,  because  the  quantity  produced 
was  relatively  so  small.  I  propose  to  illus- 
trate the  fallacy  of  that  argument  by  the  con- 
tents of  the  little  box  I  hold  in  my  hand.  So 
long  as  America  was  unprepared  to  make  Bes- 
semer steel  no  Englishman  would  sell  a  ton  of 
rails  for  less  than  $150.  I  have  told  the  story 
to  this  committee  once,  and  I  will  not  now 
repeat  the  details.  But  when  in  18G5  the  works 
of  Griswold  &  Co.,  at  Troy,  New  York,  and 
the  Freedom  Works,  at  Harrisburg,  Pennsyl- 
vania, were  ready  to  deliver  Bessemer  rails, 
Englishmen  who  had  been  swearing  that  they 
could  not  sell  them  at  less  than  $150  a  ton 
immediately  offered  them  at  $130.  And  when 
our  works  increased  from  two  to  six  they  dropped 
their  price  down  to  $100,  and  if  necessary  they 
will  drop  it  to  $50,  or  until  they  force  the  own- 
ers of  our  establishments  to  abandon  the  pro- 
duction and  apply  their  premises  and  machinery 
to  some  other  use. 

Their  policy  is  to  crowd  out  our  works  ;  or, 
as  Lord  Brougham  advised  in  1815,  just  after 
the  close  of  our  war,  "  to  spend  any  amount  of 
money  to  strangle  in  the  cradle  the  infant  in- 
dustries the  exigencies  of  the  war  had  called 


29 


into  existence  iu  the  United  States."  They 
will  spend  any  amount  of  money  to  crowd  out 
these  five  or  six  Bessemer-rail  works,  and  then 
put  the  price  up  to  figures  that  will  be  satis- 
factory to  themselves. 

I  said  I  would  illustrate  the  argument  by  the 
contents  of  a  small  box  T  hold  in  my  hand.  It 
contains  a  few  very  small  articles- and  speci- 
mens of  the  material  of  which  they  are  made. 
They  are  gas-tips  of  a  kind  that  till  quite  lately 
were  made  exclusively  in  Germany.  They  then 
sold  in  our  market  at  from  $6  to  $12  per  gross. 
I  cannot  tell  you  whether  this  afforded  so  grand 
a  profit  as  Bessemer  rails  did  at  §150  gold  per 
ton.  But,  as  recent  events  prove,  it  must  have 
paid  splendidly.  Since  the  close  of  the  war 
there  was  found  in  the  interior  of  Tennessee  a 
deposit  of  talc,  of  which  these  are  specimens, 
[holding  up  small  pieces.]  This  is  carried  not 
in  foreign  ships,  but  by  our  transportation  com- 
panies to  Boston,  giving  business  to  our  rail- 
road companies  between  the  heart  of  Tennessee 
and  Massachusetts.  There  Yankee  ingenuity 
converts  the  talc  into  gas-tips  which  will  not 
corrode,  such  as  the  Germans  make,  and  for 
which  they  had  the  monopoly  of  our  market. 
These  American  men  have  embarked  a  large 
capital  in  this  enterprise,  and  employ  many 
people  in  Tennessee  and  Massachusetts.  They 
are  busy  making  these  little  gas-tips  and  creat- 
ing a  market  for  western  grain,  and  converting 
newly-arrived  laborers  from  Europe  into  well- 
paid  American  workingmen. 

What  effect  has  their  enterprise  had  on  the 
price  of  porcelain  gas-tips?  The  German  man- 
ufacturers, who  could  not  sell  these  gas-tips  for 
less  than  $G  to  S12  a  gross,  now  suddenly  drop 
their  price  and  are  flooding  the  market  with 
them  at  S2  a  gross.  At  this  price  they  will 
soon  destroy  their  Yankee  rival  and  regain  their 
old  monopoly. 

Now,  are  we  wrong  when  we  say  that  if 
anybody  makes  a  profit  out  of  us  we  prefer 
that  it  shall  be  those  who  feed  on  American 
wheat,  wear  American  wool,  and  give  good 
wages  to  American  workmen  ?  The  little  gas- 
tip  illustrates  the  truth  that  American  compe- 
tition cheapens  foreign  commodities  quite  as 
well  as  the  weightier  article  of  steel  rails. 

SILK.  POPLINS. 

Cases  of  this  kind  are  continually  coming 
before  us.  Let  me  tell  yon  of  another  from 
away  up  in  the  mountain  counties  of  New 
York,  at  Schoharie.  A  quiet,  unpretending 
citizen,  seeing  that  there  were  a  large  number 
of  unemployed  girls  in  and  about  the  village, 
made  the  experiment  of  manufacturing  an  arti- 
cle in  great  demand  for  ladies'  dresses,  known 
as  silk  poplins.  He  equaled  the  foreign  goods 
in  quality,  was  underselling  them,  and  to  the 
extent  of  his  capacity  to  produce  was  driving 
them  out  of  the  market,  when  by  a  change  in 
the  wool  tariff  the  duty  on  his  goods  was  unin- 
tentionally reduced,  and  the  foreigners  have 
him  at  a  disadvantage  ;  and  if  we  do  not  pass 
this  bill,  or  give  him  other  relief,  he  must 


close  his  factory,  lose  the  capital  he  has  invested 
in  it,  and  scatter  the  formerly  idle  girls  he  now 
employs  at  good  wages. 

These  are  the  facts  of  the  case.  The  wool 
bill,  in  order  to  let  coarse  woolen  goods  in  at 
a  low  rate,  provides  that  when  they  are  over  a 
certain  number  of  ounces  to  the  square  yard 
they  shall  come  in  at  40  per  cent.  Poplins  are 
in  considerable  part  of  silk  ;  they  are  finer  and 
more  valuable  than  any  heavy  woolen  goods, 
but  the  silk  add  to  their  weight,  and  it  has 
been  held  that  the  duty  on  them  has  been  re- 
duced from  60  to  40  per  cent.  Unless  the  relief 
proposed  in  this  bill  be  given,  Mr.  Barr  is  likely 
to  be  ruined  and  his  factory  closed. 

TIX  AXD  NICKEL. 

The  present  law  puts  a  duty  of  15  per  cent, 
on  tin  in  pigs  or  bars.  We  produce  no  tin, 
though  I  believe  they  have  recently  discovered 
a  bed  of  ore  in  California,  and  it  is  thought  to 
exist  in  Missouri.  I  hope  it  does,  and  that  it 
may  soon  be  developed.  We  cannot  make  tin- 
plates  by  reason  of  the  duties  on  block  tin  and 
palm-oil.  This  bill  of  the  committee  proposes 
to  put  palm-oil,  an  African  product,  and  block 
tin  on  the  free  list ;  so  that  we  may  begin  the 
manufacture  of  sheet  tin,  for  which  we  export 
annually  $8,000,000  in  gold. 

While  we  have  no  well- ascertained  deposits 
of  tin  ore  the  country  abounds  in  deposits  of 
nickel.  Missouri,  Kentucky,  Virginia,  Penn- 
sylvania, New  Jersey,  and  Connecticut  have 
large  deposits  of  it ;  yet  when  the  law  of  1861 
was  passed  its  manufacture  had  not  been  at- 
tempted ;  and  a  duty  of  15  per  cent.,  the  same 
as  that  on  block  tin,  was  put  on  nickel.  Our 
bill  proposes  to  enable  the  men  of  Missouri 
to  work  the  vast  deposits  of  mine  La  Motte; 
the  men  of  Kentucky  to  work  the  large  deposits 
in  that  State,  and  the  people  of  Connecticut  to 
establish  nickel  works  in  the  immediate  vicinity 
of  their  great  factories  of  Britannia  and  other 
white-metal  wares  by  putting  the  same  rate  of 
duty  on  nickel  that  we  have  on  copper,  zinc, 
lead,  iron,  and  other  metals. 

THE  EFFECT  OF  PROTECTING  NICKEL. 

Now  let  me  show  you  what  will  be  the  effect 
of  this  measure.  I  hold  in  my  hand  a  letter  from 
Evans  &  Askin,  the  great  nickel  manufacturers 
of  England.  They  tell  us  how  they  will  punish 
us  if  we  increase  the  tariff  on  nickel ;  and  I 
hope  you  will  join  me  in  invoking  their  pun- 
ishment. But  let  them  speak  for  themselves, 
as  they  do  in  this  letter.  It  reads  thus  : 

BIRMINGHAM,  March  18, 1863. 

DEAR  SIR  :  Although  it  is  now  some  time  since  we 
had  the  pleasure  of  corresponding  wo  hear  from  time 
to  time  of  the  progress  you  are  making  in  the  nickel 
trade  in  America,  and  we  trust  you  find  the  business 
a  remunerative  and  successful  one. 

We  hear  that  attempts  are  being  made  to  influence 
Congress  to  increase  largely  the  import  duties  on 
refined  nickel,  and  although  perhaps  we  might  at 
first  regret  that  the  duties  should  be  raised,  wo  arc 
not  quite  sure  it  would  not  ultimately  be  to  our  ad- 
vantage; for,  if  the  duties  are  so  raised  as  to  render 
the  import  of  nickel  almost  prohibitory  we  shall  at 
once  adopt  measures  to  send  out  one  of  the  junior 
members  of  our  firm  and  erect  a  nickel  refinery  ID 


UUOP     LI  uivnn  i 


30 


the  State*.  In  fact  from  thelargo  quantities  of  nickel 
and  cobalt  ores  offered  to  us  by  mine  La  .Motto,  the 
llaley  Staclting  Company,  and  several  other?,  we 
are  almost  disposed  to  do  so  at  ouce,  as  we  think  it 
might  answer  pur  purpose  better  than  forwarding 
the  refined  nrticle  from  this  country.  Wo  are  not, 
of  course,  selfish  enough  to  wish  a  monopoly  of  the 
nickel  trade  in  America,  but  we  hope  and  intend  to 
have  a  share  of  it,  either  by  shipment  to  or  refining 
in  the  State?. 

Should  we  decide  upon  erecting  works  in  your 
country  may  wo  reckon  on  any  supply  of  ore  troin 
your  mine,  in  addition  to  other  sources? 

We  are,  dear  sir,  your.s,  faithfully, 

EVANS  &  ASKIX. 
Mr.  JOSEPH  WHABTON. 

Let  them  come  on  with  their  skilled  nickel- 
makers;  letthem  bring  their  capital  by  millions  ; 
let  them,  if  they  can,  bring  100,000  people  to 
consume  the  grain  of  Missouri ;  and  we  will 
give  them  all  welcome.  By  increasing  the  duty 
on  nickel  from  16  to  40  per  cent,  mine  La  Motte 
will  thus  become  a  great  manufacturing  center, 
and  there  will  be  a  new  market,  not  dependent 
on  long  lines  of  railroad  or  ocean  transporta- 
tion, for  the  grain  and  wool  of  the  valley  of  the  j 
Mississippi. 

Now,  Mr.  Chairman,  in  conclusion,  I  plead 
with  the  gentlemen  of  the  committee  to  forget 
their  sectional  feelings,  to  put  aside  party  strife, 
to  remember  that  the  glory  and  the  power  of 


their  country  depend  on  the  prosperity,  intel- 
ligence, and  aspiring  hopes  of  the  laboring 
people  and  their  children.  I  beg  them,  as  I 
know  they  all  love  their  country,  to  stand  by  her 
industries,  and  to  aid  the  poor  and  oppressed 
laborers  of  other  lands  to  escape  from  a  diet 
of  "rye  and  potatoes"  to  a  land  of  free  schools 
and  liberal  wages,  in  which  the  duily  lure  of 
the  family  will  be  of  wheat,  mutton,  beef,  or 
pork,  with  the  vegetables  and  the  fruits  of  all 
the  Statesof  ourbroadaml  then  assuredly  pros- 
perous country. 

Finding  that  space  permi's  it.  I  append  the 
following  statement  showing  the  revenue  col- 
lected each  year  from  1780  to  1868,  the  amount 
of  dutiable  imports  and  free  goods  imported 
annually,  and  the  average  rate  of  duty  on  im- 
ports annually.  It  war.  carefully  prepared  and 
appears  as  one  of  the  appendices  of  the  last 
annual  report  of  the  Special  Commissioner  of 
the  Revenue.  It  is  very  .d  to 

those  who  remember  the  financial  condition  of 
the  country  from  1837  to  1812,  and  from  ISoG 
to  18G1,  the  price  of  grain  and  the  suffering 
endured  by  the  laboring  people  at  all  commer- 
cial or  manufacturing  centers  will  prove  con- 
clusive on  many  points  : 


The  tariffs  of  the  United  States. 


Dates. 

Tariff*. 

Custom?. 

Imports. 

a 

Free. 

Dutiable. 

Total. 

•~  2 
t* 

i.  - 

From  March  4, 
1789,  to  Dee.  III. 
1790—  August  10... 

General  

1791—  March  :;  
17'  i'  —  May  2 

Spirit*  

•.473  09 

070  So 

- 

- 

0.000 
idO.OOO 

- 

8J 
11 

1793  

i.:',  5,306  56 

„ 

. 

:;],  100.000 

131 

1794  —  June  7.    .   . 

General  

_ 

_ 

. 

It 

1795  —  January  '^.. 
1796i  

Supplementary  

- 

- 

81.4 

- 

9 
8* 

1797—  Muri-h  3  

General  

7.54!  i 

_ 

. 

_ 

10 

1793  

7.1<A>,OGlWJ 

. 

_ 

_ 

10* 

179J  

001  •' 

_ 

. 

. 

M 

1800-March  13.... 
1801.... 

Sugar  and  van  en  

O.OWi  I 
1075  ' 

- 

- 

91.2 
111,363,511 

- 

0} 

9 

1802..... 

12  4.> 

_ 

. 

16 

1803  

10.479,417  01 

. 

. 

16 

1804—  Marcli  L<i  
1805—  March  LT  

Mediterranean  t'ui;d. 
Light  money  

ll.O.tS.^SJ 
1_".>'I5,*87  04 

- 

- 

- 

14 
lOi 

1803  

14  067  69S  17 

. 

. 

114 

1807  

•  ">21  01 

. 

111 

I'i.SdS.ooO  53 

. 

30 

1809 

7  *9T. 

. 

. 

12 

1810..... 

:[M  :>1 

m 

_ 

10 

1811  

!'•'•  3'". 

_ 

_ 

. 

25 

1812-July  1  
1813-Juiy  13  
1814  

Wnr.  double  duties  . 
Suit  

5/1W5.772  08 

- 

- 

- 

lit 

00 
47 

1815  

. 

lil&-Aj<ril  27  
1817  

Min.  Ibr  protection.. 

..S74  88 

- 

- 

117, 

;7 

1818—  April  20  
1819—  March  3  

Iron  nuJ  alutn  
Wiues  

v»j  00 

- 

- 

121.7 

87.1 

- 

11 

1820  

15  COJ  C12  15 

. 

1821  

18,475,703  57 

$10082313 

§52,503  411 

1822  .. 

7  •,... 

75  94?  833 

is-'S  

y  048,288 

08.530,979 

1824—  May  22  

General  rise  

12,563,773 

67,985,234 

1825  ..  . 

10947510 

85.'; 

1821...  . 

:.S61  1'7 

1215671709 

84,97 

31 


The  tariffs  of  the  United  States — Continued. 


Dates. 

Tariffs. 

Customs. 

Imports. 

a  . 

0  0 

*>3 

C  ci 
gw 

a  . 

o  e 

it 

g£ 

Free. 

Dutiable. 

Total. 

u 

PL, 

o  So 
Pk  * 

1827  

27,948,956  57 

11,855,104 

67,628,964 

79,484,068 

41.3 

35.1 

1828-May  19  

Min.  extended  

29.951,251  90 

12,379,176 

76,130,648 

88,509.824 

39.3 

33.8 

1829  

27,688,701  11 

11,805,501 

62,687,026 

74,492,527 

44.3 

37.1 

1830—  May  20  

28,389,505  05 

12,746,245 

58,130,675 

70,876,920 

48.8 

40 

1831  

36,596,118  19 

13,456,625 

89,73-4,499 

103,191,124 

40.8 

35.4 

1832—  July  14  

Modifications  

29.3-tl.175  65 

14,249,453 

86,779,813 

101,029.266 

33.8 

29 

1833—  March  2  

Compromise  

24,177,578  52 

32,447.95u 

75,670,361 

108,118,311 

31.9 

22.4 

1834  

18,900,705  98 

68,393,189 

58.128,152 

126,521,332 

32.6 

15 

1835  

25,890,726  66 

77,940,493 

71,955,249 

149,895,742 

;>6.o 

17.2 

1836  

30,818,327  67 

92,056,481 

97,923,554 

189,980,035 

31.6- 

16.2 

1837  

18,134,131  01 

69,250,031 

71,739,186 

140,989,217 

25.3 

12.4 

1838  

19,702,825  45 

60,860,005 

52,857,399 

113,717,404 

37.8 

17.3 

1839  

25,554,533  96 

76,401,792 

85,690,340 

162,092,132 

29.9 

15.8 

1840  

15,104,790  63 

57.196,204 

49,945,315 

107,141,519 

30.4 

14.1 

1841—  Sept.  11  

Free  list  tax  

19,919,492  17 

66,019,731 

61,926,446 

127,946,177 

32.2 

15.6 

1842—  August  30... 
1843  

General  rise  

16,662,74(3  84 
10,208,000  43 

30,627,486 
35  574  584 

69,534,601 
29,179,215 

100,162,087 
64,753,799 

23.1 
a5.7 

16.6 
15.7 

]S44  

29,236,357  38 

24.766.8S1 

83,668,154 

108,435,035 

35.1 

26.9 

1845 

30  952  416  21 

99  147  840 

%  106  724 

117  254  564 

32.5 

26.4 

1846-August  6  

Revenue  tariff  

26,712,668  00 

24,767,730 

96,924,058 

121,691,797 

26} 

21.9 

1847  

2-3,747,865  00 

41,772  636 

104,773,002 

146,545,638 

22i- 

1fi.« 

1848  

31,757,071  00 

22,716,603 

132.282,325 

154,998,928 

24 

20.4 

1849  

28,346,739  00 

22  377  665 

125,479,774 

147,857,439 

23 

19.2 

1850  

39,668,686  00 

22,710  382 

155,427,936 

178,138,318 

25.2 

22.3 

1851  

49,017  568  00 

25  103  587 

191,118345 

216,224,932 

26 

22.6 

1852  

47,339,323  00 

29,602,934 

183,252,508 

212.945,442 

26 

22.2 

1853  

58,931  865  06 

31,383534 

23f>,595  113 

267,978,617 

25 

22 

1854  

61,224,190  03 

33,285  821 

271,276,560 

304,562,381 

23.5 

21.1 

1855  

53  025  794  00 

40,090  336 

221,378  184 

261,468  5?0 

23 

20.3 

1856  

64,022,863  00 

56,955,706 

257,684,236 

314,639,942 

25 

20.3 

1S57—  March  3  
1858  

General  

63,875,905  00 
41,789,621  00 

66,729,306 
80,319,275 

294,160.835 
202,293  875 

360,890,141 
282,613.150 

21.5 
20 

17.7 
14.8 

1859  

49  565  8°4  00 

79  721  116 

259  017  014 

338  768  130 

19 

14.6 

1800  

53,187,511  00 

90,841,749 

279,872,327 

362,166,254 

19 

14.7 

(March     2) 
1861^  August   5^ 

39,582,186  00 

*134,559,196 

218,180,191 

352,739  387 

18.1 

11.2 

(Dec.       24J 
1862-July  14  
1863—  March  3  

General  

49,05fi,398  00 
69,059,642  00 

'•01,003,491 

44  896  6'*) 

183,843,458 
208  093  891 

275,446,939 
252  919  I'JQ 

26.7 
33.2 

17.7 
23.7 

1864—  June  30  
1865—  March  3  

General  

102,316,153  00 
81,928.260  00 

*54,244,183 
54  329  583 

275,320,951 
194,226  C64 

329.565.134 
248  555  652 

37.2 
43.7 

31 
34.2 

(March  H) 
1866^  May       1  : 

179,046  633  00 

69  728  618 

375  783  540 

415512158 

47.06 

40.2 

(July       28J 
1867—  March  2  
1868  
1869—  Feb.  24  

Wool  and  woolens... 
Copper  increased  

176,4]  7,811  00 
164,461,599  53 
180,048,426  63 

39,105,708 
29,804,147 
41,179,172 

372,627,601 
343,605,301 
395,847,369 

411,733,309 
373,409,448 
437,026,541 

47.34 
47.86 
45.48 

'  42.8 
44 
41.2 

*In  these  amounts  are  included  imports  into  the  southern  ports  durine  the  war,  from  which  no  revenue 
was  derived,  namely,  in  1861,  £17,089,2:34 ;  in  1862,  $90,789,  and  in  1864,  $2,220. 


